"In
1967-68, the guerrillas spread to the Northern region, mainly in the
Nan [น่าน]
and Chieng-Rai [เชียงราย
/ เจียงฮาย]
area, and in the three-provinces area (Phitsanuloke [พิษณุโลก],
Loei [เลย]
and Petchabun [เพชรบูรณ์]),
where the CPT [Communist Party of Thailand - พรรคคอมมิวนิสต์แห่งประเทศไทย]
has established impregnable bases and its first "liberated areas"
with "state power". Insurgency in the North first started among hill
tribes, repressed by the Thai authorities who were often corrupt and
who wanted to assimilate them. Communist infiltration had started in
the late ’50’s among these impoverished, discriminated and
uneducated tribes who, like the Meo (or Hmong [ม้ง])
people, were good warriors. The "red Meo war", as it was called in
Bangkok, started in November 1967. The suppression campaign, with
its violence, bombings, "off-limits" areas, and forced resettlement
in "new villages" in the plains, drove about half of the hill tribes
of the eastern Chieng-Rai and Nan provinces to the hills, where most
of them had no choice but to join the CPT and fight against the
central government. More refugees were generated in 1969. According
to a Thai army project to evacuate Meo and Yao people from the Nan
mountains, out of 18 villages, 5 were destroyed and 7 abandoned; the
population under government control decreased from 4,759 to 3,205.
In the North, the figures were 28 and 32 out of 101.

This probably explains why the war in this area
is bloodier than in the North- East; the bloodiest incidents have
always occurred there. Today, in Nan, most of the province is CPT
controlled and, according to local sources, the CPT could overrun it
or isolate it from the rest of the country in a few days. "They have
more soldiers than we have", a local banker told me.

The tri-provinces area was where the first
big anti-insurgency drive was conducted. It was a failure: few CPT
casualties were sustained whereas there were big losses among
Bangkok’s soldiers who were unfamiliar with counter-insurgency
operations and unacclimatised to the hard terrain. Some important
camps are located there, from where the CPT progresses slowly
southwards. According to a letter received by a Thai from a friend
in the jungle there, the camp has everything, including electricity
and medical facilities; it is self-sufficient in food (probably
scarce, though, and excluding rice), but it does not have a dentist,
said the letter. So, the former student had to walk several days to
town to see the local dentist, and then to walk back. The new
trainees are divided into four groups, for training in agriculture
production, warfare, cultural and political activities."

"We
asked peasants who were interviewed by US research teams using Thai
government interpreters "how they liked the interview" and some
answered quickly: "mai sabai" [ไม่สบาย]
which means that they felt very uncomfortable about it. In many
cases, the interviewers - so we were told - became very "impatient"
with the slow answers and the stubbornness of the rural people who
were not always prepared to reveal their "problems". The teams had
been assigned to do a certain amount of interviews per day and in
quite a "rude" way rushed through their sometimes enormous
questionnaires. Often the interpreter formulated already the "right"
answer and only asked the peasants to agree who consequently did
this quickly as a matter of politeness as well as to save time and
get back to their field work.

The
foreigners mostly interviewed heads of the family as so-called
"key-informants',' seldom women or younger members of the family who
might have articulated less "conservative" ideas. According to our
observations (and our earlier interviews proved this) the majority
of the peasants and other village people soon had developed a good
sense of what the foreigners (and even Thais from Bangkok were a
kind of "foreigners" to them) wanted to know and automatically
answered accordingly. To the students accompanying me the peasants
many times complained about the "chao-nai"-attitude of the research
teams (chao-nai [เจ้านาย]
means talking like masters or like "officials" which in this context
seems to be quite similar). In most cases "ordinary interviewees"
are in a quite precarious psychological situation.

They are not used "to speak out freely", to
articulate their grievances or to criticize official policies,
especially if they are surrounded by several government officials,
e.g. interpreters, police, village headmen, etc. Due to a
traditional social order resulting from unequal power and ownership
relations, people are not used to "articulate" what they think but
tend to be rather careful and suspicious bearing all possible
repercussions in mind. Reliable answers can therefore only be
expected if the informant remains anonymous and thus has no fear to
express his opinion. Therefore in most villages, interviews are
normally conducted with so-called "opinion leaders" (village
headmen, rich peasant, teacher, policeman, abbot of the Buddhist
temple, etc.) who in general support the government policy as they
believe it is their duty, at least when confronted with foreigners.
Nobody of the poorer folks dares to reject their statements or even
to say something deviating because the majority of the villagers can
hardly sidestep their general dependence of these people and in
addition the arbitrary manners of the local powerful are well known
to them.

[...]

For example, the government had decided to
build a bridge near the village. It is now the duty of the village
headman (pujai- ban [ผู้ใหญ่บ้าน])
who is normally appointed by the government to go from house to
house and ask the villagers to support the plan and to volunteer
manual help. In this case it is very difficult for a villager to
refuse.

If he dislikes the road building scheme
because he believes the roads are mainly used by military convois
(as it is often the case in the Northeast) and refuses to take part
in this kind of "corvée" (requisitioning of forced labour, as it was
common in feudal times), he will most possibly be blamed for his
"anti-government" attitude and be bullied by police and officials
alike or even accused as a "procommunist" because he refuses to
support "national development".

[...]

The "pet-question" of American and Japanese
research groups which were mostly concerned with social intelligence
gathering, i.e. the so-called "aspirations census", had always been
to ask the peasants: "What would you do if you were elected to
become the Prime Minister of Thailand? " Normally the answer was
only stupefied surprise (at the complete ignorance of the
interviewer who obviously did not know that this was a rather stupid
question to ask as it was well-known that this job was not available
for everybody). This "behaviour" was duly interpreted as
"passiveness" of the peasants who allegedly did not know "how to
improve their lot even if they had the means (becoming Prime
Minister) to do so"

[a.a.O., S. 51ff. -- Fair use]

"The majority of the people
inhabiting the Northeast of Thailand ("Isan" [อีสาน])
call themselves "Lao People". They account for more than five times
as much as ethnic Lao tribes in Laos (in 1975 Laos had over 3
million, the Northeast over 15 million people). However, their
loyalty is split. They say: "We are Laotian people but Thai
citizens!" (pen phu lao tae sat thai! [เป็นผู้ลาวแต่ชาติไทย]).
They still claim that Laos is the home country of their ancestors
and that the Mekong river has never been a real "border" to separate
them from their relatives on the other side. These people have a
specific regional identity which is neither Lao nor Thai but
genuinely "Northeastern" (khon pakh isan [คนภาคอีสาน])
and they say that they have other customs, other food (sticky rice,
in Thai: khao niuw [ข้าวเหนียว]),
wear different clothes and speak another language compared with the
people in Bangkok and the Central Plains of Thailand.

Even by itself, the Northeast is ethnically
quite a heterogenous region. For instance, in the area around Sakon
Nakhon [สกลนคร]
settle at least five different ethnical groups: Thai-Lao, Thai-Yaw,
Thai-Yoi, Pu-Thai and Kalerng. In addition there are smaller
minorities of Meo (H'mong), Khmer, Vietnamese, Chinese and Indians."

[a.a.O., S. 55. -- Fair use]

"Consequently many people
were puzzled that they were suddenly taught "community development"
by busy foreigners though mutual help and good neighbourship were
long-established traditions of the rural people and were only
disrupted by outside interference into the self-contained cycle of
village life. And all these "miracles" happened, so the people were
told by mobile propaganda units, "mainly to prevent the peasants
from becoming communists". It was therefore no surprise that the
rural folks became more and more curious about "communism" as even
the powerful government was evidently so afraid of it. "Communism",
as some older people told us most secretively, was probably
something like the Phu Mi Bun movement, a revolt of dissatisfied
peasants "in the North" who dared to challenge the authorities and
prepared for liberating the whole Northeast from corrupt officials,
brutal landlords and unscrupulous "loan sharks". Thus, the fierce
anti-communist propaganda having for long alienated the peasants
from the government helped to pave the way for communist ideas which
soon circulated in the villages rather than containing them as it
was originally intended."

[a.a.O., S. 60. -- Fair use]

"BASIC
NEEDS AND PROBLEMS OF THE RURAL PEOPLE

As we asked the peasants about their most urgent needs (kwarm tong
kahn [ความต้องการ])
and most pressing problems (panha [ปัญหา]),
we got the following answers which will be itemized here according
to priority:

Water and irrigation for the
rice-fields, drinking water, wells etc. (the Northeast often
suffers from droughts in the dry seasons, the water for drinking
is mostly unclean and brackish).

Land. The plots for farming are in
general too small, tenancy rates are high, taxes are excessive,
land ownership problems often remain unsettled. Government
officials use unfair practices when they tax the land or
distribute credits which go mostly to the rich and not to those
in need.

Roads, bridges and means of transport to
eliminate the power of local middlemen, traders etc. and give
the producers a chance to market their products themselves.

Protection against landlords, bandits,
cattle thieves and corrupt officials including the police. Often
armed thugs raid smaller hamlets and take the harvest and the
water buffalos away, leaving the people behind in misery.

Medical supplies, small hospitals in the
vicinity, a cheap public health system.

Fertilizer and pesticides, tools and
water pumps to increase the productivity of the land provided by
the government on the basis of cheap loans to avoid that the
peasants get further into debts and hence lose their land.

Credits with low interests to buy back
mortgaged land, thereby to secure a plot of land large enough
for subsistence reproduction."

[a.a.O., S. 73f. -- Fair use]

"Already
at the time of Field Marshal Sarit [สฤษดิ์ ธนะรัชต์, 1908 - 1963]
and well before the escalation of American involvement in Vietnam,
"anti-communism" in Thailand had proved to be a convenient formula
to suppress all kinds of opposition against the government and soon
spread like hysteria down to the lower ranks of the provincial
administration. Politicians of radical opposition parties who
advocated land reform and social change were labeled as "communists"
and could be detained for an unlimited period of time. A policeman
in a distant village, who was able to "catch a communist" improved
his chances for promotion. For that reason peasants in the Northeast
get used to tell the police if their cattle was stolen by ordinary
bandits, that this was done by "communists" only in order to speed
up the chase for the culprits.

The more
the government started to intensify its anticommunist propaganda
campaign, the more the peasants became curious about that rare
political animal which the government officials feared so much and
which the rural people called respectfully "nai-communit" [นายคอมมิวนิสต์]
(Mister Communist)."

"Thao Thep Kasattri
(ท้าวเทพกระษัตรี)
and Thao Sri Sunthon (ท้าวศรีสุนทร)
were styles awarded to Than Phuying Chan (ท่านผู้หญิงจัน),
wife of the then recently deceased governor, and her sister, Khun
Muk (คุณมุก),
who defended Phuket Province (ภูเก็ต)
in the late eighteenth century. According to popular belief, they
repelled a five-week invasion by Burmese in 1785, by dressing up as
male soldiers and rallying Siamese troops. Chan and Muk were later
honored by King Rama I with the Thai honorific Thao, as Thao
Thep Kasattri and Thao Sri Sunthon, respectively.

The "Heroine's Monument" honouring
them is situated on the main highway (402) between the Phuket International
Airport and Phuket town."

There is no single
outstanding Thai-language newspaper, but some have attained somewhat
greater prominence than others either because of circulation or
influence (see table 1). One of the most widely read newspaper is
Phim Thai [พิมพ์ไทย]
(Thai Press), a popular, morning newspaper specializing in
sensationalism. Edited in 1967 by Chayong Chawalit [ชัยยงค์
ชวลิต], it devotes little attention to political
developments, on which its position is neutral. Extensive space is
given to scandal stories and crime reports. Owned by the Thai
Commercial Company, Phim Thai moved to new quarters in 1963,
equipped with modern rotary presses.

Siam Nikorn [สยามนิกร]
(Siamese People) also owned by the Thai Commercial Company, has an
estimated circulation of 20,000. Formerly a leftist newspaper, it
has adopted a more moderate position and in 1967 was one of the
leading dailies, popular with the better educated. Its coverage of
international affairs is praised as complete and constructive.

Another important daily is
Siam Rath [สยามรัฐ] (Siam state); royalist
in orientation, it has considerable influence and is noted for high
journalistic standards. Founded in 1950, it claims a circulation of
about 30,000. Government officials and educated persons generally
predominate among Siam Rath's readers.

Sarn Seri [สารเสรี]
(Free Press) is another quite widely read Thai-language daily owned
by the Dhana Karn Phim Company [ธนาคารพิมพ์]
which is also the owner of the much larger newspaper, Thai Raiwan [ไทยรายวัน]
(Thai Daily).

Kon Muang [คนเมือง]
(People of the North), the only nonmetropolitan daily, is published
in Chiengmai. Founded in 1961, it has modern printing facilities and
has attracted many readers in the provinces of the Northern Region.

There are four
Chinese-language dailies, all established after World War II and
owned independently. They are usually pro-West in orientation and
abstain from commenting on Thai political events. The standards of
the two leading Chinese dailies, in respect to news coverage and
presentation, are comparable to those of the better metropolitan
dailies in the United States. They report extensively on
international events and devote much space to commercial and
financial information. Unlike their Thai counterparts, Chinese
dailies publish both morning and evening editions and are
distributed through circulation agents.

Sing Siang Yit Pao [星暹日報] (Daily
Siam star) and Siri Nakorn (Pride of the City) are the most
important among the Chinese dailies. With estimated circulations of
about 45, 000 and 28, 000, respectively, they appeal mostly to
educated readers.

Sakol [สากล]
(Universal Daily) and Thong Hua (China Daily), with circulations of
approximately 5, 000 and 25, 000, respectively, feature general
news, interspersed with reports on crime and fiction items. They
appeal mostly to readers in the middle and lower income groups.

The English-language
daily, The Bangkok Post, reported a paid circulation of 13, 000 in
1967. started in 1946 as a commercial venture by a United States
journalist, the controlling interest later was sold to Lord Thomson
[Roy Herbert Thomson, 1st Baron Thomson of Fleet, 1894 – 1976],
a Canadian newspaper publisher who continued the editorial policy of
its founder. The Bangkok Post's format is essentially that of a
United States small-town newspaper, and it gives extensive coverage
to international news. It achieved recognition as an established
institution in the foreign community and among the Western-educated
Thai.

The other equally
prominent English-language daily, noted for the feature articles
contained in its Sunday supplement, is the Bangkok World with
approximately the same circulation as the Post. The Bangkok World in
1967 was purchased by Lord Thomson, who already owned The Bangkok
Post, and by Cowles Communications, Incorporated, of New York.

Among the nondailies
published in the Bangkok-Thon Buri area, The Standard, an
English-language weekly, is edited by Princess Ngamchitr Prem [งามจิตร
เปรม]. Intended for “officials, diplomats and socialites... ” it
features international news and publishes special articles on the
cultures of countries represented by embassies in Bangkok.

Nakorn Thai [นครไทย]
(Thai City) is a 5-day newspaper
specializing in general news and lottery results.

The Weekly Bangkok Times,
with a press run of 20, 000, is one of the most widely read nondaily
newspapers in the metropolitan area. It concerns itself mainly with
religious affairs and with Thai cultural and religious traditions.

Siang Chiengmai [เสียงเชียงใหม่]
(Voice of Chiengmai) and Siang Rath [เสียงรัฐ]
(Voice of the People)一the latter published in Nakhon Ratchasima [นครราชสีมา]—are
the most popular nondaily newspapers in the Northern and Northeast
regions, respectively.

A variety of magazines are
financially unstable and have small circulation. Some of them are of
general interest, but many of them are specially devoted to sports,
motion picture stars, television, fashion or other popular subjects.

Women’s magazines,
patterned after those in the United States, include Satri Sarn [สตรีสาร]
(Women’s Magazine) and an English-language publication, The Lady.
The latter is edited by Princess Ngamchitr, who also is editor of
The Standard.

Professional magazines are
limited to a small group, including Chang Ahkas [ช้างอากาศ
?] (The Air Engineer's Digest), published by the
Thai Air Force Engineering Department, and Vithya Sastr [วิทยาศาสตร์]
(The Science Review), published by the Science Association of
Thailand.

Nine Chinese periodicals
were published in Bangkok in 1966. Lien Yu (Friend Magazine) with a
circulation of 4, 000 to 5, 000 is among the most popular ones. It
is published monthly and features general pictorial news.

The rest of the Chinese
periodicals一mostly weeklies—have estimated circulations of between
1, 000 and 3, 000; they feature motion picture news, serialized
fiction and some current news items."

Chancha Suvannathat [จรรจา สุวรรณทัต]:
A study of social influences on the development of children in the
village of Napa. -- In: Summaries of three studies concerning the socialization of Thai
children / [Hrsg.] Bangkok Institute for Child Study. -- Bangkok :
Bangkok Institute for Child Study, 1967. -- 16 S. ; 26 cm.

"In reading the military
literature on guerrilla warfare now so fashionable at the Pentagon,
one feels that these writers are like men watching a dance from
outside through heavy plate glass windows. They see the motions but
they can't hear the music. They put the mechanical gestures down on
paper with pedantic fidelity. But what rarely comes through to them
are the injured racial feelings, the misery, the rankling slights,
the hatred, the devotion, the inspiration and the desperation. So
they do not really understand what leads men to abandon wife,
children, home, career, and friends; to take to the bush and live
gun in hand like a hunted animal; to challenge overwhelming military
odds rather than acquiesce any longer in humiliation, injustice, or
poverty."

Beginn des Flora of Thailand Project, "the first and
only systematic attempt to inventory, catalogue, describe and elucidate all
plant life of Thailand." Der erste Band (hrsg. von Tem Smitinand and Kai
Larsen) erscheint 1970:

"Father Joseph (Joe) H. Maier, C.Ss. R., (born
31 October 1939) is an American
Redemptorist priest who lives and works in the
Klong Toey (คลองเตย) slums of
Bangkok,
Thailand,
where he co-founded the
Human Development Foundation (HDF-Mercy Centre) (ศูนย์เมอร์ซี่) with Sister Maria Chantavarodom
(มาลินี ฉันทวโรดม) in 1973.[1]
For over 35 years, he has administered to Bangkok's poorest, providing
vulnerable children and families alternatives to and haven from drugs,
violence, sex abuse and prostitution in the squatter slums.[2]

Early life

Joseph Maier was born at Cowlitz General in Longview,
Washington in 1939, the son of a Catholic mother, Helen Childs Maier, and a
German Lutheran, George Maier.[3]
His parents separated when Maier was 5 years old, and later divorced.
Thereafter, Maier was raised primarily by his uncle in Longview, Washington.
Maier enrolled in a Redemptorist seminary in California as a high school
freshman and was assigned to Bangkok upon completion of his studies.[3][4]

Father Joe first arrived in Thailand in 1967. He
ministered in northern Isan and to the
Hmong in Laos before settling permanently in Bangkok's "Slaughterhouse"
slums, located next to the Chao Praya River in the Klong Toey district.[5]

HDF
-Mercy Centre

The HDF began as a single one-baht-a-day preschool,
and has since expanded into a network of over 30 schools all over Bangkok,
which have graduated an estimated 35,000 children.[2]
Today, in addition to schools, HDF operates orphanages and homes for street
kids, assists children and adults living with AIDS, provides emergency
assistance and home repair to slum families affected by crippling floods and
fires, acts in cooperation with community members to mediate activities
involving welfare organizations, housing authorities, governmental agencies
and the Port Authority of Thailand.[6]

In 2000, a gift from Atlanta businessman and
philanthropist John M. Cook allowed for the major physical expansion of
Mercy facilities.[7][8]
The multi-structure compound includes a 400-pupil kindergarten, a home for
street kids, a home for mothers and children with AIDS, a 26-bed free AIDS
hospice, a legal aid anti-trafficking unit, and various administrative
offices that oversee operations ranging from a sponsor-a-child program, to
community health and outreach services.[8]
The Centre includes a house for Father Joe on Mercy grounds, the terms of
the donation having stipulated that he move out of the Slaughterhouse slums
and away from the ostensible health hazards of slum living.[4]

The Mercy Centre extended its humanitarian efforts to
southern Thailand following the devastating 2004
Asian Tsunami, sending down relief teams to directly aid remote villages,
from Satun to Ranong, hit hard by the disaster.[9]

Interfaith Dialogue

Father Joe has been both praised and criticized for
his broad religious philosophy.[10]
In a 2004 PBS documentary, he described himself as having been "converted"
by Buddhists and Muslims, remarks that have stirred some controversy.[2]
He made a similar comment in 2008, when he told CNN, "Buddhists and Muslims
taught me how to be a Christian."[2]

Recognition

Mercy is regularly sought out by foreign dignitaries.
Recent visitors have included Prince Alfred and Princess Raffaela of
Lichtenstein in March 2003;[11]
AIDS activist and American film actor
Richard Gere (1949 - ) in July 2004;[12]
and American president
George W. Bush (1946 - ) in August 2008.[13][14]

Father Joe is the recipient of numerous awards and
honors in recognition of his life's work.[15]
In 2004, he was personally thanked by
Queen Sirikit (จอมพลหญิง จอมพลเรือหญิง จอมพลอากาศหญิง
สมเด็จพระนางเจ้าสิริกิติ์ พระบรมราชินีนาถ, 1932 - ) as the foreigner who has made the most significant
contribution to the protection of the women and children of Thailand.[16]

Writings

Welcome to the Bangkok Slaughterhouse is a
collection of 24 short stories about the Mercy Centre children, written by
Father Joe and published by Asia Books. All book proceeds go to the Human
Development Foundation.[2][17]
Father Joe was also a regular contributor to Sunday Perspective section of
the Bangkok Post before the section's discontinuation in late 2008."

Report of the United Nations Survey Team on the Economic and Social Needs of the
Opium-Producing Areas in Thailand, January/February 1967. -- Bangkok :
Government Printing Office, 1967. -- 144 S. : Ill. ; 26 cm

improving communications between
villagers and government authorities;

increasing civic action programmes; and

developing an information and
psychological operations programme for the benefit of the rural
population.

Direct military operations against the
communist terrorists were, by contrast, only a secondary priority.

As the 09/10 Plan indicates, CSOC’s
information and psychological operations effort is of basic
importance. It is designed to inform the rural population and
explain government programmes and policies to them. In other words,
it seeks to narrow the gap in understanding between the people and
the various military, civil and police authorities. In doing this we
are using the media as fully as possible. There are now 82 hours of
radio programming each week from 27 stations across the country
devoted to these aims. We are producing numerous leaflets, posters
and pamphlets printed by the Royal Thai Army Propaganda Platoon’s
light mobile teams, at present attached to CSOC. We are also
deploying in the field 13 fully trained and equipped military Mobile
Audio-Visual Units or MAVU teams. Nine more civilian mobile
information teams will be added later this year when medical
equipment and vehicles being provided under SEATO (South-East Asia
Treaty Organisation) support for the government’s counter-insurgency
programme arrive."

"Late
in January of 1967, Thai counter-insurgency troops raided a
Communist camp deep in the jungles of Thailand, only twenty miles
from the city of Betong [เบตง].

Even the Thai troops were shocked by what they
discovered: the camp contained thatched huts for two hundred people;
there was a more than ample supply of weaponry and other implements,
indicating that the Communist campers had settled down to a village
life of farming and insurgency. The camp was littered with Communist
propaganda leaflets along with excerpts from the writings of Mao
Tse-tung [毛泽东, 1893 - 1976] and handwritten
manuals on guerrilla warfare. There were only two "white people" in
camp; they were stuffed-dummy likenesses of Uncle Sam and John Bull,
toys which the Communists used for playing darts in their spare
time. Throwing darts at Uncle Sam is a readily believable pastime
for the Communist insurgents in the northeast, but such hostility
toward Great Britain is unheard of along the banks of the Mekong.
Alas, the raided camp was not in northeast Thailand; rather, it was
some one thousand miles from Nakornpanom [นครพนม],
in the extreme southern end of Thailand, just across the border from
Malaysia. With this discovery it became irrefutably clear that the
Communist insurgents now have strong footholds along both the
northeastern and southern tips of Thailand. Even the government in
Bangkok, located in the precise middle of the country, admits they
now have trouble on two fronts."

"On the morning of 3
January 1967 'the Thai government made official a speculation that
had appeared in the press several days earlier; it announced that a
reinforced Thai battalion would be sent to fight in South Vietnam.
The following reasons for this decision were given:

Thailand is
situated near Vietnam and it will be the next target of communists,
as they have already proclaimed. This is why Thailand realizes the
necessity to send Military units to help oppose communist aggression
when it is still at a distance from our country. The government has
therefore decided to send a combat unit, one battalion strong, to
take an active part in the fighting in South Vietnam in the near
future.

This combat
unit, which will be composed of nearly 1,000 men, including
infantry, heavy artillery, armored cars, and a quartermaster unit
will be able to take part in the fighting independently with no need
to depend on any other supporting units.

This decision
can be said to show far-sightedness in a calm and thorough manner,
and it is based on proper military principles. The time has come
when we Thais must awake and take action to oppose aggression when
it is still at a distance from our country. This being a practical
way to reduce danger to the minimum, and to extinguish a fire that
has already broken out before it reaches our home. Or it could be
said to be the closing of sluice-gates to prevent the water from
pouring out in torrents, torrents of red waves that would completely
innundate our whole country.

Opposing
aggression when it is still at a distance is a practical measure to
prevent our own country being turned into a battlefield. It will
protect our home from total destruction, and safeguard our crops
from any danger threatening. Our people will be able to
continue enjoying normal peace and happiness m their daily life with
no fear of any hardships, because the battlefield is still far away
from our country.

Should we wait
until the aggressors reach the gates of our homeland before we take
any measures to oppose them, it would be no different from waiting
for a conflagration to spread and reach our house, not taking any
action to help put it out. That is why we must take action to help
put out this conflagration, even being willing to run any risk to
stave off disaster. We must not risk the lives of our people,
including babies, or run the risk of having ~ to evacuate them from
their homes, causing untold hardship to all the people, everywhere.
Food will be scarce and very high-priced.

It is therefore
most proper and suitable in every way for us to send combat forces
to fight shoulder-to-shoulder with other countries in opposition to
aggression, especially at a time when that aggression is still far
away from our country. This is a decision reached that is most
proper and suitable, when considered from a military, a political
and an economic angle.

This decision led to a
number of problems for the United States. The first was the amount
of logistical support to be given Thailand. The United States
assumed that the Thai unit would resemble the one proposed, that is,
a group of about 1,000 men, organized into infantry, artillery,
armored car, and quartermaster elements, and able to fight
independently of other supporting forces. Assurances had been given
to the Thai Prime Minister that support for the force would be in
addition to support for the Thai forces in Thailand, and would be
similar to that given the Thai forces already in South Vietnam.
These assurances were an essential part of the Thai decision to
deploy additional troops. Thus the Department of Defense authorized
service funding support for equipment and facilities used by Thai
units in South Vietnam, and for overseas allowances, within the
guidelines established for support of the Koreans. Death gratuities
were payable by the United States and no undue economic burden was
to be imposed on the contributing nation.

With the Thai troop
proposal now in motion, the Commander in Chief, Pacific, felt that
U.S. Military Assistance Command, Vietnam, and US Military
Assistance Command, Thailand, should begin discussions on
organization, training, equipment, and other support problems
pertaining to the deployment of the Thai unit. The US Embassy m
Bangkok, however, was of a different mind. The ambassador pointed
out that General Westmoreland had asked for a regimental combat
team. This request had been seconded by the Commander in Chief,
Pacific, the Secretary of State, and the Secretary of Defense. The
ambassador said he still hoped to obtain a regimental-size unit but
did not believe negotiations had reached the stage where detailed
discussions as suggested by the Commander in Chief, Pacific, should
be undertaken."

"In 1966, an ARPA [Advanced
Research Projects Agency] project called the Rural Security Systems Program (RSSP became known in social science circles.
The goal of the program was to

"assist the Royal Thai Government
and the U.S. Mission in Thailand in their efforts to suppress the growing
Communist insurgency in that country's northeast provinces."32

The RSSP's methodology was similar to the
general methodology of ARPA and Project Agile: to gather data on geography, "way
of life," and attitudes toward the government; to compile files on insurgent
activities and government responses; and to analyze the effectiveness of
government responses "to plan future Cl [counterinsurgency] programs." The
program was a first for Agile, according to Congressional testimony:

This program will mark the first
time that R&D has been given a major role in supporting a counterinsurgency
in a comprehensive way, from the earliest stages of the conflict.

[...]

Several social scientists responded
vocally to the RSSP program. Anthropologists

Charles Keyes [1937 -
] (University of
Washington),

Michael Moerman (UCLA),

Herbert Phillips (University of Califomia-Berkeley), and

Lauriston Sharp [1907
- 1993] (Cornell)

wrote to Seymour Deitchman
[1923 - 2013],
then director of Project Agile, requesting information on RSSP, citing its
Project Camelot-like implications.34 ARPA's stated objectives in
Thailand were very similar to those of Camelot in Latin and South America.

At Deitchman's invitation, the four
anthropologists met with him in Washington on January 5, 1967.
According to Deitchman's account of the meeting, the four anthropologists were
concerned that RSSP was going to involve hundreds of social scientists
descending on Thailand. They were told that this was not the case. However, they
were also told that it was designed to "resolve the problems of insurgency" and
to study how development might prevent insurgency. According to Deitchman, the
anthropologists were worried about the pressure being exerted by the U.S. on
Thailand for development. Some time after the meeting, Deitchman says, word
reached him that Peter Kunstadter, another anthropologist then working in
Thailand, was worried that a large ARPA social science project in his area would interfere
with his research.

At the conclusion of his meeting with
the four anthropologists, Deitchman gives the following account of their support
or noninterference with ARPA's objectives (which varies with the accounts of the anthropologists):

I then asked whether, since they were
among the recognized American experts on Thai culture and history, they would be willing
to help us do a better job by helping in the research. The responses varied. One
said that if the work were later to be criticized, he would not want to be
associated with it but would rather be free to join the critics (although he
later sent us a copy, which was very helpful, of his yet-to-be-published Ph.D.
thesis on life in Thai village society). Others promised benevolent neutrality.

But one of the group decided that it
was time to "put my money where my mouth is," and to help if he agreed with our
objectives. This was Dr. Herbert Phillips of the
University of California (Berkeley), who became an ARPA consultant and who in
the course of the next two years was to provide much useful understanding of the
background to the problems with which ARPA was involved in Thailand.36

According to Deitchman, that makes one
paid consultant (Phillips); one who does not wish to be associated with ARPA if
ARPA will later come under criticism, but who then sends a copy of his
dissertation to help out (probably Moerman); and two for "benevolent neutrality"
(probably Keyes and Sharp). No one voiced opposition to the program on the basis
of its explicit intent to help the U.S. and Thai counterinsurgency effort.

Deitchman also writes that

as late as 1968 one anthropologist,
who had earlier been concerned that he not come under attack by his colleagues
for undertaking counterinsurgency research, nevertheless indicated his
willingness to accept ARPA support for an overseas linguistic study he had
in mind.38

Sometime between January and
March 1967, Moerman and Keyes, writing for the group that met with
Deitchman, issued a memorandum to "AACT [Academic Advisory Council
for Thailand] members and [the] ad hoc committee on ARPA
Northeastern Thailand Project," explaining their understanding of
RSSP. They begin by being "worried that the ARPA scheme might be
another 'Camelot',"42 but then provide reassurance:

Insofar as the social
science component is concerned, the major objective is to study
"rural security" in northeastern Thailand. The first efforts
will be directed towards compiling an inventory on the locations
and characteristics of the villages in an area of the project's
interest. This information will be used to place in perspective
subsequent knowledge about changes (including "security
incidents") and the impact of government programs—both Thai and
American—which occur in the villages of the area.43

One primary concern stated
by Moerman and Keyes in the memo corresponds with Deitchman's
account. In their two-and-a-half page memo, the authors state or
allude to no less than three times that the number of researchers
will not be as large as they had imagined. They describe the project
as though the collection of specific data on villages and villagers
was intended to be similar to a census rather than part of a
counterinsurgency program.

To counteract the "danger
that the project might become too purely military," the authors
suggest the training of Thai personnel to eventually take over the
project.44 Their argument here is that "without Thai
participation the project (and, by implication, American social
science) is open to the accusation of intellectual colonialism...."45
This is a strange assertion on two counts. First, the phrase "too
purely military" implies that a "somewhat military" project might be
acceptable. Second, Thais conducting an American project under
American direction are hardly independent from "intellectual
colonialism."

At the conclusion of the
memorandum, the authors give a circuitous imprimatur ("benevolent
neutrality" in action?) to the project:

Although the
anticipated project is not the sort in which academic field
workers usually participate, its scale and importance make
it one of which all doing fieldwork in Thailand will have to
take account. In addition, the size and complexity of programs
of directed culture change in northeastern Thailand, ARPA's
desire for accurate knowledge and ARPA's refusal to commit
itself in advance to a single technique for social science
research all will impinge upon and contribute to intellectual
inquiries about the nature of Thai society and culture."

"The solution in Vietnam is
more bombs, more shells, more napalm . . . till the other side
cracks and gives up.

We're making life
unpleasant for the VC [Vietcong] ... at least I think we are.
Finally, they'll say "Ho, we're smarter than they are—" [side
comment by DePuy: "I don't have much faith in our brainpower, only
in our firepower"]—"our cause is more just . . . but enough is
enough. Let's lie low for a few years and get the U.S. to go home.

We're winning the war. We're killing VC,
guerrillas, Main Forces, destroying their bases, destroying caches
of food and weapons, we're getting more Chieu Hoi [defectors]. If
people in Washington want to win fast—if they're in a hurry, because
of elections or something—they could move five more divisions over
here and get the job done faster. But if they're not in such a
hurry, we can do the job with what we've got, i.e., including the
9th Division.

Pacification hasn't worked anywhere. But the
1st Division is doing one thing: killing guerrillas.

We have long-range programs now to destroy
the Phu Loi Battalion. In general, to get the VC provincial
battalions: keep probing, searching, harassing the areas where they
take their leave, training, and rest, their bases. Keep bombing
their base areas: we need a sensor that would signal to us when
someone had entered that area, so we could bomb it.

You need fast reaction to contact: with air
strikes. Even against a squad, or snipers, I'd use an air strike;
artillery is no good when they have overhead cover."

"In the meantime
representatives of the Vietnam and the Thai military assistance
commands met and held discussions during the period 27-30 January
1967 on various aspects of the pending deployment. In February the
commitment of Thai troops was affirmed and on 13 March the unit
began training. The Thai contingent would eventually be located with
and under the operational control of the 9th US Infantry Division.
On 15 March representatives of the Royal Thai Army and US Military
Assistance Command, Thailand, met with the MACV staff to finalize
the unit's tables of organization and equipment and allowances.
Discussions were, held also on training, equipage, and deployment
matters. The approved table of organization and equipment provided
for a regimental combat team (minus certain elements) with a
strength of 3,307, a 5 percent overstrength. The staff of the
regimental combat team, with its augmentation, was capable of
conducting field operations and of securing a base camp.
Organizationally, the unit consisted of a headquarters company with
a communications platoon, an aviation platoon, an M 113 platoon, a
psychological operations platoon, a heavy weapons platoon with a
machine gun section, and a four-tube 81-mm. mortar section; a
service company consisting of a personnel and special services
platoon and supply and transport, maintenance, and military police
platoons; four rifle companies; a reinforced engineer combat
company; a medical company; a cavalry reconnaissance troop of two
reconnaissance platoons and an M 113 platoon; and a six-tube 105-mm.
howitzer battery. On 18 March the approved table of organization and
equipment was signed by representatives of MACV and the Royal Thai
Army.

During the above discussions,
the Royal Thai Army agreed to equip one of the two authorized M113
platoons with sixteen of the Thai Army's own armored personnel
carriers (APC's) provided by the Military Assistance Program; the
United States would furnish APC's for the remaining platoon. This
was necessary because all APC's scheduled through the fourth quarter
of fiscal year 1967 were programed to replace battle losses and fill
the cyclic rebuild program for US forces. Subsequently, however, the
Royal Thai Army re-evaluated its earlier proposal and decided to
deploy only the platoon from headquarters company, which was to be
equipped with APC's furnished from US project stocks. The platoon of
APC's in the reconnaissance troop would not be deployed with
Thai-owned APC's. The Royal Thai Army was agreeable to activating
the platoon and using sixteen of its APC's for training, but
insisted on picking up sixteen APC's to be supplied upon the
platoon's arrival in South Vietnam. If this was not possible, the
Thais did not plan to activate the reconnaissance platoon until the
United States made a firm commitment on the availability of the
equipment. In view of this circumstance, MACV recommended that an
additional sixteen M113's be released from project stocks for
training and subsequent deployment with the regiment."

"Equipment problems were
not limited to APC's and PGM's. The original plan of the joint
Chiefs of Staff for allocation of the M 16 rifle for the period
November 1966 through June 1967 provided 4,000 rifles for the Thais.
A phased delivery of 1,000 weapons monthly was to begin in March. In
February 1967, however, the Commander in Chief, Pacific, deferred
further issue of the M16 rifle to other than US units. Complicating
this decision was the fact that the Military Assistance Command,
Thailand, had already informed the Royal Thai Army of the original
delivery date. Plans had been made to arm the Royal Thai Army
Volunteer Regiment with the first weapons received, which would have
permitted training before deployment. An acceptable alternative
would have been to issue M 16's to the Thai regiment after it
deployed to South Vietnam, had any weapons been available in
Thailand for training; but all M 16 rifles in Thailand were in the
hands of infantry and special forces elements already engaged with
the insurgents in northeast Thailand. Failure to provide the rifles
any later than April would, in the view of the commander of the Thai
Military Assistance Command, have repercussions. Aware also of the
sensitivity of the Koreans, who were being equipped after other Free
World forces, the commander recommended that 900 of the M 16's be
authorized to equip the Thai regiment and to support its
pre-deployment training. The Commander in Chief, Pacific, concurred
and recommended to the joint Chiefs that the 900 rifles be provided
from the March production. Even with the special issue of M 16's, it
was still necessary to make available another weapon to round out
the issue. The logical choice was the M 14, and as a result 900 M
14's with spare parts were requested; two factors, however, dictated
against this choice. The first was the demand for this weapon to
support the training base in the continental United States, and the
second was the fact that the Koreans were equipped with M 1's.
Issuing M 14's to the Thais might have political consequences. As a
compromise the Thais were issued the M2 carbine."

"Those who are easily
deceived into joining the communists are mostly the people in remote
backward areas or in places far away from developed societies. They
are too stupid [เขลา]
[khlao] to perceive imminent dangers around them. They don't feel
all the changes taking place in the present world. Therefore, if
somebody [a communist] lures them into doing something bad, they
drift away [to that person], just as wax melts away with fire [เสมือนขี้ผึ้งที่ถูกร้อนด้วยไฟ]
[samuen khi phueng thi thuuk ron duay fai]."

"Do not forget either,
Messieurs les rouges - and this is a reminder to you and not a
threat - that it is Sihanouk to whom you owe the privilege you enjoy
at present of carrying out all your activities without fear of
ending your days. Is there any need to remind you that in Indonesia
there was no great difficulty in wiping out seven hundred thousand
communists, and to point out that it is enough for me, not even to
give the order but simply to remain silent and you, who are only a
few hundred, will disappear even more quickly? [Laughter and
applause] We do not lack our Suhartos [1921 - 2008] and Nasutions
[Abdul Haris Nasution, 1918 - 2000] in Cambodia [more applause],

I would also inform you that I have other
radical methods of destroying your illusions, namely if I leave the
country - temporarily - and leave you face to face with our Suhartos
and Nasutions [more laughter]. Leaving the country without anyone
knowing is something I am also capable of, since I have tried it
- successfully - by flying out two months ago without your
knowledge [more laughter]."

"The photo was taken
in 1966 at Takhli, Nakhon Sawan Province, Thailand, (15 16' 40.08 N; 100 17'
44.49" E), a wartime operating base from which routine morning and then
afternoon strikes on Hanoi were launched consisting of perhaps 48 fighters
supported by Boeing KC-135A tankers and Douglas RB-66C stand-off jammers.
The elevation of the camera suggests that I was in the EWO seat of an Wild
Weasel F-105F taxing out for an afternoon mission. Note the relative size of
the fighter vs the crew-chief walking away. The pictured "D" is loaded in
the typical manner with two 450 gal. fuel tanks and five one-thousand-pound
low drag bombs. The load and route distance is similar to that of B-17s
London to Berlin. The defenses around Hanoi were also similar to Berlin."

His Royal Highness The Prince Philip, Duke of
Edinburgh, Earl of Merioneth, Baron Greenwich, Royal Knight of the Most
Noble Order of the Garter, Knight of the Most Ancient and Most Noble Order
of the Thistle, Grand Master and First and Principal Knight Grand Cross of
the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire, Member of the Order of Merit,
Companion of the Order of Australia, Extra Companion of the Queen's Service
Order, Royal Chief of the Order of Logohu, Canadian Forces Decoration, Lord
of Her Majesty's Most Honourable Privy Council, Privy Councillor of the
Queen's Privy Council for Canada, Personal Aide-de-Camp to Her Majesty kommt
zu einem einwöchigen Privatbesuch nach Thailand.

Abb.: His Royal Highness The Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, Earl of
Merioneth, Baron Greenwich, Royal Knight of the Most Noble Order of the
Garter, Knight of the Most Ancient and Most Noble Order of the Thistle,
Grand Master and First and Principal Knight Grand Cross of the Most
Excellent Order of the British Empire, Member of the Order of Merit,
Companion of the Order of Australia, Extra Companion of the Queen's Service
Order, Royal Chief of the Order of Logohu, Canadian Forces Decoration, Lord
of Her Majesty's Most Honourable Privy Council, Privy Councillor of the
Queen's Privy Council for Canada, Personal Aide-de-Camp to Her Majesty, 1962
[Bilquelle: Tony French / Wikipedia. --
Creative
Commons Lizenz (Namensnennung, share alike)]

"The Asia Foundation
is a non-profit, non-governmental organization professing a
commitment to the "development of a peaceful, prosperous, just, and
open Asia-Pacific region." The Foundation supports Asian initiatives
to improve governance, law, and civil society; women's empowerment;
economic reform and development; sustainable development and the
environment; and international relations. Founded in 1954,[1]
The Foundation claims nearly 60 years of experience in Asia and
works with private and public partners in the areas of leadership
and institutional development, exchanges, and policy research.
Starting January 1, 2011, David Arnold serves as president of the
Foundation.[1]
The Foundation is governed by an eminent and well-known group of
private sector trustees.

Sources of funding for the organization have
included the Central Intelligence Agency,[2][3]
the U.S. Agency for International Development, the World Bank, the
Asian Development Bank, the United Nations Development Program,
official development assistance agencies of Australia, Canada,
Netherlands and the United Kingdom, an annual appropriation from the
U.S. Congress, and contributions from private corporations and
foundations."

"The Samlaut Uprising, otherwise called the Samlaut
Rebellion or Battambang Revolts, consists of two significant phases of revolts
that first broke out near Samlaut (ស្រុកសំឡូត) in
Battambang Province (បាត់ដំបង) and subsequently spread into surrounding Provinces in
Cambodia
during 1967-1968.The revolutionary movement was largely made up by the dissident
rural peasantry led by a group of discontented leftist intellectuals against
Prince
Norodom Sihanouk’s (នរោត្តម សីហនុ,
1922 – 2012) political organization –the Sangkum
regime (សង្គមរាស្ត្រនិយម).

The rebellion first erupted in early 1967 in the Samlaut
subdistrict when hundreds of frustrated peasants who were fed up with the
government policies, treatment by local military, land displacement, and other
poor socio-economic conditions, revolted against the government, first killing
two soldiers on the morning of April 2.[1]
In the following weeks, the revolt quickly expanded with much more destruction
brought upon government property and personnel. By June 1967, 4,000 or more
villagers fled their homes in Southern Battambang Province into the marquis (forest)
to join the growing group of rebels and escape the military troops sent by
Sihanouk.[2]
Following after in the early 1968, Cambodia experienced a more organized and
matured second uprising that had expanded both geographically and politically
through months of re-grouping, recruitment and propaganda processes, and was
much more widespread and destructive than the first occurrence.[2]

According to some academics such as Ben Kiernan
(1953 - ) and Donald
Kirk (1938 - ), the Samlaut rebellion is seen as the initial beginnings of the Cambodian
revolutionary movement (the
Cambodian Civil War) that eventually led to victory of the Communist forces
Khmer
Rouge (ខ្មែរក្រហម)
and the establishment of the
Democratic Kampuchea (កម្ពុជាប្រជាធិបតេយ្យ).

Kiernan says that the rebellion was the “baptism of fire
for the small but steadily growing Cambodian revolutionary movement”[2]
while Kirk mentions that it was “a prelude, in a microcosm, of the conflict that
would sweep across the country three years later.”"

"In February-March 1967 the
enemy started the civil war in Battambang [បាត់ដំបង],
forcing five thousand people to flee into the jungle. Then in March
Lon Nol [លន់ នល់, 1913 –
1985] declared open war on our people. He brought in
five thousand troops from Oddar Meanchey [ឧត្ដរមានជ័យ],
Battambang, Pursat [ខេត្តពោធិ៍សាត់]
and Phnom Penh [ភ្នំពេញ]
to sow destruction with airplanes, artillery, tanks and infantry,
commanded by Nhek Tioulong [ញឹក
ជូឡុង, 1908 – 1996] with the French Lieutenant-Colonel Léon Leroy
as adviser. By that time our Party was already properly organized
with a good network from the bases to the Centre. It is quite true
that our Party had not yet raised the principle of armed struggle,
but in the face of this massive civil war by the enemy, our Party
had to fight back with arms."

"And as I ponder the
madness of Vietnam and search within myself for ways to understand
and respond in compassion, my mind goes constantly to the people of
that peninsula. I speak now not of the soldiers of each side, not of
the ideologies of the Liberation Front, not of the junta in Saigon,
but simply of the people who have been living under the curse of war
for almost three continuous decades now. I think of them, too,
because it is clear to me that there will be no meaningful solution
there until some attempt is made to know them and hear their broken
cries.

They must see Americans as
strange liberators. The Vietnamese people proclaimed their own
independence in 1954—in 1945 rather—after a combined French and
Japanese occupation and before the communist revolution in China.
They were led by Ho Chi Minh. Even though they quoted the American
Declaration of Independence in their own document of freedom, we
refused to recognize them. Instead, we decided to support France in
its reconquest of her former colony. Our government felt then that
the Vietnamese people were not ready for independence, and we again
fell victim to the deadly Western arrogance that has poisoned the
international atmosphere for so long. With that tragic decision we
rejected a revolutionary government seeking self-determination and a
government that had been established not by China—for whom the
Vietnamese have no great love—but by clearly indigenous forces that
included some communists. For the peasants this new government meant
real land reform, one of the most important needs in their lives.

For nine years following 1945 we denied the
people of Vietnam the right of independence. For nine years we
vigorously supported the French in their abortive effort to
recolonize Vietnam. Before the end of the war we were meeting eighty
percent of the French war costs. Even before the French were
defeated at Dien Bien Phu, they began to despair of their reckless
action, but we did not. We encouraged them with our huge financial
and military supplies to continue the war even after they had lost
the will. Soon we would be paying almost the full costs of this
tragic attempt at recolonization.

After the French were defeated, it looked as if
independence and land reform would come again through the Geneva
Agreement. But instead there came the United States, determined that
Ho should not unify the temporarily divided nation, and the peasants
watched again as we supported one of the most vicious modern
dictators, our chosen man, Premier Diem. The peasants watched and
cringed and Diem ruthlessly rooted out all opposition, supported
their extortionist landlords, and refused even to discuss
reunification with the North. The peasants watched as all of this
was presided over by United States influence and then by increasing
numbers of United States troops who came to help quell the
insurgency that Diem’s methods had aroused. When Diem was overthrown
they may have been happy, but the long line of military dictators
seemed to offer no real change, especially in terms of their need
for land and peace.

The only change came from America as we
increased our troop commitments in support of governments which were
singularly corrupt, inept, and without popular support. All the
while the people read our leaflets and received the regular promises
of peace and democracy and land reform. Now they languish under our
bombs and consider us, not their fellow Vietnamese, the real enemy.
They move sadly and apathetically as we herd them off the land of
their fathers into concentration camps where minimal social needs
are rarely met. They know they must move on or be destroyed by our
bombs.

So they go, primarily women and children and the
aged. They watch as we poison their water, as we kill a million
acres of their crops. They must weep as the bulldozers roar through
their areas preparing to destroy the precious trees. They wander
into the hospitals with at least twenty casualties from American
firepower for one Vietcong-inflicted injury. So far we may have
killed a million of them, mostly children. They wander into the
towns and see thousands of the children, homeless, without clothes,
running in packs on the streets like animals. They see the children
degraded by our soldiers as they beg for food. They see the children
selling their sisters to our soldiers, soliciting for their mothers.

What do the peasants think as we ally ourselves
with the landlords and as we refuse to put any action into our many
words concerning land reform? What do they think as we test out our
latest weapons on them, just as the Germans tested out new medicine
and new tortures in the concentration camps of Europe? Where are the
roots of the independent Vietnam we claim to be building? Is it
among these voiceless ones?

We have destroyed their two most cherished
institutions: the family and the village. We have destroyed their
land and their crops. We have cooperated in the crushing of the
nation’s only noncommunist revolutionary political force, the
unified Buddhist Church. We have supported the enemies of the
peasants of Saigon. We have corrupted their women and children and
killed their men.

Now there is little left to build on, save
bitterness. Soon the only solid physical foundations remaining will
be found at our military bases and in the concrete of the
concentration camps we call “fortified hamlets.” The peasants may
well wonder if we plan to build our new Vietnam on such grounds as
these. Could we blame them for such thoughts? We must speak for them
and raise the questions they cannot raise. These, too, are our
brothers."

"Direk Jayanama
(Thai: ดิเรก ชัยนาม)
(January 18, 1905 -1967-05-01)[1]
was the founding member of the Thai Revolution that had instilled
Democracy for all Thais, together with Field Marshal P Pibulsonggram
(แปลก พิบูลสงคราม,
1897 - 1964) and Pridi Panomyong (ปรีดี
พนมยงค์,1900 - 1983).

Notability

Jayanama served many important post in the Thai government
during its infancy. During WWII when he held the post of Foreign Minister to
become the Ambassador to Japan. Other posts held during his years in service for
Thailand were Deputy Prime Minister, Foreign Minister (on many occasions),
Justice Minister, and Finance Minister. During this time, he also served as the
Thai Ambassador to the Court of St. James (England), Germany, Finland, etc.

Jayanama also founded the Thammasat
University Faculty of Political Science.

Family

Direk was the older brother of Pairote Jayanama, former
Permanent Secretary of Foreign Affairs (who had 4 sons that eventually became
ambassadors), and AM Jayanama, an Air Force General at the time.

Direk Jayanama was married to Khunying
ML Pui (member of the aristocratic Nopawongse royal bloodline) with 4 sons. One
of them, Wattana Jayanama, became an important figure during the establishment
phase of the Bank of Thailand."

Draft Memorandum von US
Verteidigungsminister Robert McNamara an den US Präsidenten Johnson:

"SUBJECT

Future Actions in Vietnam

General
Westmoreland [1914 - 2005] and
Admiral Sharp [1906 - 2001] have
requested 200,000 additional men (100,000 as soon as possible with
the remainder probably required in FY
[Financial Year] 1969) and 13 additional tactical air
squadrons for South Vietnam. The program they propose would require
Congressional action authorizing a call-up of the Reserves, the
addition of approximately 500,000 men to our military forces, and an
increase of approximately $10 billion in the
FY 68 Defense budget. It would involve the virtual certainty
of irresistible pressures for ground actions against “sanctuaries”
in Cambodia and Laos; for intensification of the air campaign
against North Vietnam; for the blockage of rail, road, and sea
imports into North Vietnam; and ultimately for invasion of North
Vietnam to control infiltration routes. The Joint Chiefs of Staff
recognize that these operations may cause the Soviet Union and/or
Red China to apply military pressure against us in other places of
the world, such as in Korea or Western Europe. They therefore
believe it essential that we also take steps to prepare to face such
hostile military pressures. The purpose of this paper is to examine
the recommendations of our military commanders and to consider
alternative courses of action.

This
memorandum is written at a time when there appears to be no
attractive course of action. The probabilities are that Hanoi has
decided not to negotiate until the American electorate has been
heard in November 1968. Continuation of our present moderate policy,
while avoiding a larger war, will not change Hanoi's mind, so is not
enough to satisfy the American people; increased force levels and
actions against the North are likewise unlikely to change Hanoi's
mind, and are likely to get us in even deeper in Southeast Asia and
into a serious confrontation, if not war, with China and Russia; and
we are not willing to yield. So we must choose among imperfect
alternatives.

[...]

CHAPTER FOUR.
RECOMMENDATIONS

The war in
Vietnam is acquiring a momentum of its own that must be stopped.
Dramatic increases in US troop
deployments, in attacks on the North, or in ground actions in Laos
or Cambodia are not necessary and are not the answer. The enemy can
absorb them or counter them, bogging us down further and risking
even more serious escalation of the war.

Course A [der
Vorschlag von Westmoreland und Sharp] could lead to a major national
disaster; it would not win the Vietnam war, but only submerge it in
a larger one. Course B likewise will not win the Vietnam war in a
military sense in a short time; it does avoid the larger war,
however, and it is part of a sound
military-political/pacification-diplomatic package that gets things
moving toward a successful outcome in a few years. More than that
cannot be expected. No plan can be fashioned that will give a better
chance of success by 1968 or later. Attempts to do so not only
produce dangerous plans but also are counterproductive in that they
make us look overeager to Hanoi.

We
recommend Course B because it has the combined advantages of being a
lever toward negotiations and toward ending the war on satisfactory
terms, of helping our general position with the Soviets, of
improving our image in the eyes of international opinion, of
reducing the danger of confrontation with China and with the Soviet
Union, and of reducing US losses."

"Thai naval assistance
was also sought. In the latter part of May, MACV decided that the
South Vietnamese Navy would be unable to utilize effectively the
motor gunboat (PGM) 107 scheduled for completion in July. It was
then recommended that the boat be diverted to the Royal Thai Navy
and used as a Free World contribution. The Military Assistance
Command, Thailand, objected, however, and preferred that the boat be
transferred to the Thai Navy under the Military Assistance Program
as a requirement for a later year. Since the Thai Navy was already
operating two ships in South Vietnam, a request by the United States
to operate a third might be considered inappropriate, particularly
in view of the personnel problems confronting the Thais, and the
ever-present insurgency threat facing Thailand from the sea. Since
Thailand wanted to improve its Navy, the Thais saw no advantage in
manning a ship that was not their own. In addition, the US Navy
advisory group in Thailand had been continuously stressing the need
for modernization of the Thai Navy. To suggest that the Thais
contribute another Free World ship would appear contradictory. A
more acceptable approach, the US Navy group reasoned, would be to
offer the PGM-107 as a grant in aid of a future year, and then
request Thai assistance in the coastal effort, known as MARKET TIME,
by relieving the other PGM when it was due for maintenance and crew
rotation in Thailand. This approach would give additional Royal Thai
Navy crews training in coastal warfare, increase the prestige of the
Thai navy, and meet the continuing need for a Thai presence in South
Vietnam. Overtures to the Thai government confirmed the validity of
the Navy group's reasoning. The Thais did not wish to man the new
PGM-107 as an additional Free World contribution."

"Thai Premier Thanom
Kittikachorn openly made the same point in June of 1967. "We have
definitely decided to evacuate the North Vietnamese," he said, "and
we have been in negotiations with the South Vietnamese government on
this subject. We don’t yet know if the Saigon government will accept
them." But on the same day Premier Thanom made his views known, the
Saigon embassy in Bangkok announced that the South Vietnam
government would not allow the refugees in its territory because the
refugees are committed to, and under the control of, Hanoi."

"Because of the communist
threat in Thailand's northeastern Changwad [จังหวัด]
(provinces), it is important to assess the social, economic and
political climate of villages like Nam Thieng. This data will help
to mould development and security programs for villagers who might
otherwise be misled by communist propaganda."

"a secret review of
counterinsurgency research in Thailand"; an undertaking "to
explore policy questions" and "to learn what was known to
Americans about Thai society, and to assess the impact of
American aid and policy on Thai society"; and as an attempt "to
explore the usefulness of creating a 'SS' [social science]
Jason." [JASON Defense
Advisory Group, kurz JASON, ist eine unabhängige Gruppe von
Universitätswissenschaftlern in den USA, die die Regierung in
technologischen Fragen der nationalen Sicherheit beraten.
(Wikipedia)]

The minutes of IDA's Thailand Study Group are
replete with discussions about the advisability of setting up a
social science Jason to mirror the physical science Jason already in existence. The social scientists
present also freely contributed opinions and recommendations to a dialogue that
included such topics as insurgency and counterinsurgency tactics, U.S. policy
objectives in Thailand, the nature of U.S.-Thai relations, and the problems of
rural government.

Participants in the Thailand Study Group were
aware that further consulting fees would follow the creation of a
social science Jason, with benefits accruing to both the U.S.
government and themselves. While discussing the advantages of this,
there were frank exchanges as to whom IDA served and what function
Thailand would have in all of this. As one social scientist put it:

"Thailand is a good place to study
because there are things going on there that can be studied
which are not going on elsewhere. It is like a laboratory
[emphasis added].""

"In
a letter to the AAA [American
Anthropological Association]
Newsletter [Januar 1971], Moerman recounted the formation of
the Study Group as follows:

In 1967, a representative of Jason, a
group of physical scientists who consult for the government,
asked me to help arrange a summer seminar on US policy to
Thailand in which representatives of government agencies would
brief and listen to a floating group of social scientists
specializing in Thailand. Jason's purpose was to experiment with
the possibility of adding a social science component. This
interest in Thailand was an accidental compromise, but I (along
with the co-organizer) felt that the social scientists could
alert the government to the dangers of directing its aid,
"Occupant, Thailand," with no knowledge or concern for how that
aid benefitted some kinds of persons and consequently deprived
other—frequently better—ones. The conference failed on both
grounds. Jason decided, wisely I feel, that it would be a
mistake to add a social science component. I learned that every
single American agency that spoke to us took counterinsurgency
as its main policy rationale. They were therefore unconcerned
with the harm their programs might be doing the Thai people. I
was unwilling to consult for the government, and so ceased in
September 1967."

Director of Project Agile for the
Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA)

G. Farrar

AID [Agency for International
Development], "responsibility for all of
AID planning"

J. Fitzgerald

"in ISA [Office of the Assistant
Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs]
concerned with policy planning on V.N. [Vietnam]—assistant
for COIN [counterinsurgency] planning"

P. Franklin

ARPA

Murray Gell-Mann [1929 - ]

California Institute of Technology,
physicist, conference organizer

Robert Gomer [1924 - ]

University of Chicago, chemist

James Hoath

United States Operations
Mission/Thailand (AID), chief of Research and Evaluation
Division

Howard Kaufman

Cornell Aeronautics Laboratory

Louis Lomax [1922 - 1970]

author of Thailand: The War That Is,
The War That Will Be

Millard F. Long

University of Chicago, economist

Michael Moerman

UCLA, anthropologist

Jesse Orlansky

Founder of Dunlap and Associates, a
behavioral research firm; psychologist

Herbert Phillips

University of Califomia-Berkeley,
anthropologist

Steven Piker [1937 - ]]

Swarthmore College, anthropologist

Gary Quinn

ARPA

Lauriston Sharp [1907 - 1993]

Cornell University, anthropologist

General Maxwell Taylor [1901 - 1987]

President of IDA [Institute for Defense Analyses]
as of 1966

M. Ladd Thomas

Northern Illinois University, political
scientist

Other individuals present at the conference
were two people whose affiliation was identified only as "Jason"
(Henry W. Kendall and Louis Mayer), at least two who seem to be
government officials judging from their statements at the Summer
Study (L. Carter, Carl Nelson), and W. Bell, P. Gyorgy, Robinette
Kirk ("works for Mr. Lomax"), Don Marshall; H. Moskowitz, W. Stark
(apparently connected with ARPA), S. York, and S. Young."

"Farrar
of USAID weighed in with what AID thought would be a useful function
for social scientists working with the police and intelligence
services:

We ought to sensitize the Thais to the
need for this kind of information [attitudinal and behavioral
indices] and encourage them to get it. The question is how to
get the Soc. Sci. community to infiltrate the police and
intelligence group and let them obtain the information."

Look (US-Zeitschrift): "A visit with the King and
Queen of Thailand" / von Gereon Zimmermen:

Der König sieht sich als gewählten König:

"I am really an elected
king. If the people do not want me, they can throw me out, eh? Then
I will be out of a job."

Der König über die chinesische Gefahr:

"When
I asked the king about Chinese communism, he was painfully specific:
"It means three things, really. There are the Chinese, there are
Chinese communists, and there are communists. The Chinese have
always been a threat to Southeast Asia, because they are an
expansive people. It depends on the time and the place for them. In
Thailand, there are many of them, and it is hard to absorb them.

"Thailand is threatened. In the northeast
villages, the communists are either Thai Chinese or North
Vietnamese. These communist agents work villages that are remote and
without modern communications. They are quite active. Generally, the
people do not believe them, but in the remote areas, if the people
do not cooperate, the communists kill them. It is the same old story
as the Chicago gangsters in your country. If the peasants do not
pay, their homes are burgled or they get killed. Sometimes, they are
‘enlisted to liberate the country.’ Now, of course, some government
officials upcountry do not do their jobs properly, so the peasants
have a reason to become bitter and rebel. But their bitterness is
not against Thailand, it is against the officials.

"Thai people are not communists. For example,
if you consider our religion [Theravada Buddhism] and consider all
of its rules, it is democratic. Thus, the monks. They all have their
rights, and they operate in a manner similar to that of a
parliament. Each has the right to say what he thinks. We in Thailand
have, then, a basis for democracy and good living.

"Communism is impractical. Life is not each
to his needs. The one who works today should get the money and the
goods, not the one who doesn’t work. Communism can be worse than the
Nazis or the Fascists. In practice, it is more terrible than a
dictatorship. If, however, a dictator is a good man, he can do many
things for the people. For a short while, Mussolini did many good
things for the Italian people. But once he was bitten by the ‘bug of
empire,’ he was finished."

"Within the framework of
Thai-German technical cooperation four German experts were
dispatched in Thailand to support the departments of
bacteriology/serology, parasitology, pharmacology and pharmacognosy
at the Public Health Research Institute in Bangkok. Their activities
included the installation of the respective laboratories as well as
training of laboratory personnel.
The project significantly improved the working conditions at the
central laboratory of the PHRI and its branches in Phitsanulok [พิษณุโลก],
Haad Yai [หาดใหญ่],
and Songkhla [สงขลา]
resulting in improved reliability of the test results. At the end of
the project the production of serum, which formerly had to be
imported from abroad, was possible at the institute."

"[villager:] What is your
purpose in coming here, and what kinds of questions are you going to
ask us?

[interviewer:] We came here to
study how people feel towards certain things, what people think
about certain things; and we also want to study the effectiveness of
certain development programs.

[villager:] I mean, tonight, what do you want
to ask us about tonight? You are not going to take the names of
villagers and tell the police that we are communists, are you? We
would die, if you did....

[villager:] The reason that I ask you about
communists is that I really want to know the reason why your
research team is here, in our village. We are very much afraid of
communists here; we don't know what they look like because we have
never seen them. So many people have cautioned us about them. We
have heard that, elsewhere, they send their agents in to recruit
villagers, and sometimes they come in helicopters, to take away
those whom they have recruited. If they come to take us away, in
that manner, it will surely kill us, because we are opposed to
communists here.

All of us are Buddhist devotees, and are of
unshakable Buddhist faith.

[interviewer:] (explains to Dr. TY [Toshio
Yatsushiro {1917–2015}].)
He says that he doesn't even know what communists are; he has only
heard about them and what they do.

[Yatsushiro:] If you don't know about
communists, why are you afraid of them?"

"The liaison arrangements
and groundwork for deployment of the Thai unit were completed in
July. Following a liaison visit by members of the 9th US Infantry
Division, the Royal Thai Army Volunteer Regiment was invited to send
liaison men and observers to the 9th Division. As part of the
training program in preparation for the scheduled September
deployment, five groups of key men from the Thai regiment visited
the 9th Infantry Division between 6 and 21 July 1967. Numbering
between thirty-four and thirty-eight men, each group was composed of
squad leaders, platoon sergeants, platoon leaders, company executive
officers, company commanders, and selected staff officers. Each
group stayed six days while the men worked with and observed their
counterparts. During the period 12 to 14 July, the commander of the
Royal Thai Army Volunteer Regiment, accompanied by three staff
officers, visited the 9th US Division headquarters."

"Thailand was considered a
possibility with the thought that it might come through with an additional
3-5,000 over the next six months, but it would, in Bundy's words, "take
very careful handling." In fact, earlier on 3 July the President had had a
conversation with the King of Thailand on just this very subject. The
President had posed the problem raised for the United States by the need
to respond to General Westmoreland's request for an additional 200,000
troops. He said that it would be impossible for him, President Johnson, to
get support for such additional forces unless the troop-contributing
allies also put in more troops on a proportional basis. Thanat [Außenminister
Thanat Khoman - ถนัด คอมันตร์,
1914 - ] pointed out that when the Thai
government asked for 2,500 volunteers in Vietnam, 50,000 had come forward,
but the King pointed out the problem was not men willing to fight, but
training and weapons. The President said that we could help with training
and equipment. The problem was to get a distribution of the 200,000 which
was fair and equitable. The President then asked Mr. Rostow [Nationaler
Sicherheitsberater Walt Rostow, 1916 - 2003] on the basis of
population how might the extra 200,000 be distributed? Rostow had replied
that it came out to something like 125,000 and 75,000, with Thailand
required to put up about 20,000 as its share. The King then cited three
problems: the quality of recruits, to which the President had said we also
had to draw on and train men of lower IQ and physical quality than we
might wish; the training and equipment of additional troops and the
improved equipment of the forces left behind in Thailand. The King
elaborated at some length on the psychological and political problems
posed by the latter element, saying it was very hard for the military to
accept sending troops abroad well equipped when they themselves were
lacking in modern equipment. After discussing the specific equipment, the
President telephoned Secretary McNamara [Verteidigungsminister Robert
McNamara, 1916 - 2009] and informed him of the King's response to which
McNamara said that it would not be worth our while to train and equip a
few thousand more Thais for Vietnam but if Thailand could furnish 10,000
he could guarantee their training and equipment."

"Debate over the date of
deployment of Thai troops to Vietnam arose when on 5 July the Thai
government announced a plan to commit the Royal Thai Army Volunteer
Regiment against the Communist insurgents in northeast Thailand. The
purpose of this move was to build up the regiment's morale and give
it combat experience before it went to South Vietnam. At MACV
headquarters the plan was viewed with disfavor for several reasons.
An operation in northeast Thailand would delay deployment of the
regiment in Vietnam from one week to two months. The additional use
of the equipment would increase the probability that replacement or
extensive maintenance would be necessary prior to deployment.
Further, the bulk of the equipment programed for the Thai regiment
had been taken from contingency stocks, thus giving the Thais
priority over other Free World forces, and in some instances over US
forces, in order to insure early deployment of the regiment. The
Thai regiment was dependent, moreover, on the 9th Division for
logistical support; therefore supplies and equipment scheduled to
arrive after 15 August had been ordered to Bearcat where the 9th
Division was providing storage and security. Delay in the arrival of
the Thai regiment would only further complicate problems attendant
in the existing arrangements. Finally, several operations had been
planned around the Thai unit and delay would cause cancellation,
rescheduling, and extensive replanning. Logistical, training, and
operational requirements in South Vietnam had been planned in great
detail to accommodate the Thai force on the agreed deployment dates,
and any delay in that deployment would result in a waste of efforts
and resources.

The weight of these arguments
apparently had its effect, for on 27 July the Military Assistance
Command, Thailand, reported that the Thai government had canceled
its plans to deploy the regiment to the northeastern part of the
country."

Beginn der Einrichtung des The
Infiltration Surveillance Center in Nakhon Phanom (นครพนม):
"The Infiltration Surveillance Center, also known as ISC or as Task Force
Alpha was the monitoring location for the sensors placed along the Ho Chi Minh
Trail as part of Projects IGLOO WHITE and MUSCLE SHOALS."

"The deployment of the
Royal Thai Army Volunteer Regiment (the Queen's Cobras) to South
Vietnam was divided into four phases. Acting as the regiment's
quartering party, the engineer company left Bangkok by Royal Thai
Navy LST on I I July 1967 and arrived at Newport Army Terminal on 15
July. After unloading its equipment the company traveled by convoy
to Bearcat, where it began work on the base camp. The advance party
traveled by air to Bearcat on 20 August. The main body of the
Queen's Cobras Regiment arrived during the period 19-23 September
1967. The last unit to reach Vietnam was the APC platoon, which had
completed its training on 25 September and was airlifted to South
Vietnam on 28 November."

Importance of not over-estimating the terrorist
movement in the north-east. (Paragraph 14.)

The Thais are afraid of China and although they
do not like to be dependent on foreigners they will tolerate the
American presence as long as they feel that it keeps danger at a
distance. If the Americans let go in Viet-Nam the Thais might change
course. There is not likely to be a sudden revulsion against the
Americans. (Paragraphs 15-16.)

Our stake in Thailand is the same as that of
other West European countries. Our membership of SEATO makes no
difference. Our export performance could be better. (Paragraph 17.)

The Thai tradition of sending children to
England to be educated gives us a certain advantage. The best way we can
help the Thais is in the field of education. (Paragraph 18.)

The pleasures of living in Thailand, the virtues
of the Thais and a tribute to the Embassy staff. (Paragraphs 19-20.)

Sir, 13 July, 1967.

I am on the point of leaving Bangkok after a stay
of two and a half years and have the honour to set down some thoughts
about Thailand which I hope may be of some interest to my successor. They
are thoughts rather than convictions. There is a theory that the Thais are
rather easier for Europeans to understand than are other oriental people.
I do not believe this theory. It seems to me that Sino/Indian/Malay/ Thai
ways of thought are so alien to ours that analogies between events in
South-East Asia and events in Europe are nearly always misleading, that
forecasts based on such analogies are bound to be wrong, that the motives
of Asians are impossible for us to estimate with any exactness, and that
Thailand and the Thais offer no exception to these precepts. The general
level of intelligence of the Thais is rather low, a good deal lower than
ours and much lower than that of the Chinese. But there are a few very
intelligent and articulate ones and I have often tried to get some of
these with whom I believe myself to be on close terms to come clean with
me and to describe their national characteristics as they see them
themselves and to explain why they behave in this way rather than in that
way. The result has never been satisfactory. Something always seems to be
held back. Perhaps I am not on such close terms with them as I think I am.
Perhaps they do not expect that I will believe them or even understand
them if they were to be entirely frank. It may be that they are just
determined for reasons unknown to retain a last barrier of reserve. There
is also a small handful of foreigners in Bangkok who have lived here for a
long time and whose opinions about the Thais are worth listening to. But
most of these confess to there being great areas of Thai mentality which
they have long ago given up attempting to penetrate. My own thoughts about
the character of the Thais and about the things they are likely to be up
to next therefore have a strictly limited value.

2. There is one thing that nevertheless seems to me
to be quite certain and that is that Bangkok dominates Thailand in the
same way in which for centuries Paris dominated France. Events outside
Thailand can obviously have an effect inside the capital and in some
circumstances provincial developments might have a limited influence. But
all political, economic and social changes of any importance in Thailand
are the result of calculations and decisions taken by men in Bangkok and
reflect the development of relationships between men or groups of men in
Bangkok. There are historical reasons for this. Until recently it was the
King who decided everything. It was only by being attached to the King’s
court that anyone could hope to acquire influence or money. The great
courtiers and officers of state lived at the capital wherever it might be.
Ayudhya or Bangkok. They might be sent out to govern provinces or lead
armies but although they received rewards in the form of land they never
thought of living on their estates any more than did the courtiers of
Louis XIV. There are no great country houses in Thailand and although the
Princes of Chiengmai, Lampang and Nan still conduct a shadowy existence
there is no provincial aristocracy. The Chinese merchants and
money-lenders can make small fortunes in the provincial towns but if they
want to get into the big league they must move into the city. There is no
other city. Bangkok now has a population of 2 ½ million (it will be 6 or 7
million by 1980). The next largest town has a population of 100,000.
Bangkok is the only real port for ocean-going vessels and when they build
a new port they will build it near at hand. Industrial development is
centred in the neighbourhood of the capital. A civil servant sent out to
work in the provinces feels as if he had been exiled. Medical services in
Bangkok are quite good, but in some provinces they scarcely exist at all,
so reluctant are doctors and nurses to take up appointments outside the
city and so small are the financial inducements to do so. There are some
new provincial universities but the authorities are having great
difficulty in getting them properly staffed. Bangkok sucks everything to
itself. It is moreover extraordinary how little the average citizen of
Bangkok knows at first hand about the rest of his country. Those who can
afford to travel for pleasure go to Europe and America. Apart from
occasional visits to nearby seaside resorts or to Chiengmai which has a
certain snob appeal they do not dream of travelling in any other part of
the country. They are simply not interested.

3. The Government is conscious of the dangers of
this top-heaviness and with the help of foreign loans and advice is trying
to open up the country as fast as it can. The construction of roads and
the expansion of agriculture are the top priorities in its national
development plans. But if we except the limited areas, chiefly in the
north-east, in which years of neglect have contributed to the growth of a
small and primitive Viet Cong type revolutionary movement, it is fair to
say that in spite of Bangkok the peasants, who constitute more than
three-quarters of the population, seem for the most part to be happy and
by Asian standards prosperous. They suffer from plenty of illnesses such
as tuberculosis and liver-fluke which combine with the climate in draining
their energy. But there is little malnutrition except in some places, as
the result of ignorance, among infants. The average peasant owns his own
holding. He can grow enough rice to sell to the local Chinese middle-man,
he owns a bullock or two and he is showing himself to be quite quick at
learning how to grow other crops, though he is not generally very
energetic or ambitious. Some of the new wealth created in the capital by
industry and trade percolates down to him although he gets less than his
fair share of it. He even looks better dressed than he did two years ago.
New roads and irrigation schemes bring him unlooked-for benefits however
slowly. He is not interested in ideas and does not care much one way or
the other about what happens in Bangkok. He has a vague feeling of loyalty
to the King. He is almost impervious to political propaganda. For the next
few years at least the foreigner who wants to follow what is going on in
Thailand had best keep his attention fixed on Bangkok. Let him by all
means travel around for his own pleasure to visit some of the 40,000
villages and to see the background against which the action in Bangkok is
being played out. But let him concentrate on watching the actors in the
front of the stage and dismiss from his mind the idea that they may
suddenly be thrust aside by the incursion of a crowd of fresh actors from
the wings. I do not believe that any such thing is likely to happen, at
least not in the time of my successor for whose benefit I am writing this
despatch.

4. The outward aspect of Bangkok has undergone some
regrettable changes during the last few years. When I caught a glimpse of
it in 1955 it was a pretty place of canals and trees and scarlet-and-gold
temples. It is now fast becoming one of the ugliest towns in the world,
indistinguishable from the meaner parts of Tokyo or Los Angeles. But there
have been no corresponding changes in the habits or attitudes of the
inhabitants though there are of course many more of them. The traveller
Henri Mouhot described the whole of Siamese society in the mid-19th
century as being "in a state of permanent prostration, every inferior
receiving his orders from his superior with signs of abject submission and
respect ". This is metaphorically still true of Bangkok and in some
details still literally true. But I would go so far as to make the
unfashionable assertion that the most steadying feature in the body
politic of Thailand, irritating and even repulsive though it may be, is
precisely this sense of his place in society possessed and accepted by
each and every individual. The god-like position of the King is questioned
by nobody, not even by the handful of Thai exiles who compose seditious
propaganda (at least not openly) Foreigners get sickened by the unctuous
servility with which the local Press reports the daily doings of His
Majesty; and conversely even Europeanised Thais are quick to resent any
off-hand references to the King or the Queen in the foreign Press however
well intentioned these may be. Below the King, very far below him, the
individuals who control the nation are ranged in their respective places
each one knowing exactly how he or she stands in relation to each other.
These relationships are perfectly clear to the Thais themselves and are on
the whole accepted as part of the natural order of things. The foreigner
must not try to unravel and define them in all their complexity because
the task is too difficult. The best he can do is to try to understand the
general rules by which they seem to be established.

5. Since the revolution of 1932 which put an end to
the absolute monarchy, though scarcely affecting the veneration owed to
the monarch, proximity to the source of military power has been the most
important factor in assuring influence and position. In that year there
was a sort of cataclysm in the Siamese universe producing a new magnetic
field and setting the stars on new courses. The shock-waves are still felt
to-day although their force has diminished since the death of
Field-Marshal Sarit in 1963. Money is another important factor. All Thais
love money and the possession of it is regarded as a sign of virtue or
merit. They call it vitamin M. The amount of it and the use made of it is
of more significance in their eyes than the method by which it has been
acquired. Family connections are very important. Even good birth is still
a factor to be reckoned with, for weight is still given to titles and
honorifics and the rules of social precedence continue to be strictly
regarded. Nearly all those who have handles to their names are descended
from one or other or both of the great 19th century Kings, Mongkut or his
son Chulalongkorn, each of whom had about 100 children. Moreover until
1932 the State was almost entirely administered by this royal nobility
with the result that the public service came to be regarded and is still
regarded not just as respectable but as the most honourable of all
possible careers. On great State occasions when everyone is dressed up as
though he were at the court of King Babar the senior civil servants wear
the same white uniforms as the courtiers and are indistinguishable from
them. And the tradition of obsequiousness which might be proper or at
least understandable in a royal court has been carried over into the Civil
Service. Independence of mind is frowned upon and willingness to take
responsibility is firmly discouraged. But the making of money by the
exploitation of official position is accepted as normal provided certain
understood limits are not exceeded. This has always been so and it is
natural that it should continue to be so, so long as the public service
confers more prestige than do other occupations and yet remains miserably
paid.

6. At the end of the list of factors which
determine the rules of relationship is that collection of human qualities
or assets, intelligence, good education, hard work, single-mindedness and
so forth which we ourselves pretend to prize. In Thailand these qualities
count for a certain amount but they count for very much less than they do
in Europe or America. As time goes on perhaps they will come to count for
more. The affairs of the country become more complicated as it develops
and the men who are called upon to regulate them have to have a certain
equipment which is not necessarily possessed by a general however tough or
a princeling however near the throne. Some of the top civil servants are
men of ability, trained for the most part in Europe or the United States.
But naturally gifted and hard-working and even honest as they may be they
are still a long way from playing the part which we would think it proper
for them to play. And they themselves are still too much affected by the
rules which govern Thai society to claim such a part as their right or to
feel any deep resentment about the handicaps under which they suffer. Many
of them feel frustrated and they will talk about this frustration quite
openly, but they are still a long way from contemplating any action to
redress their complaints.

7. Thailand is governed by a benevolent
dictatorship without a dictator. It is benevolent in the sense that it
does its best according to its lights to promote the welfare of the people
and that the rule of law prevails. Apart from minor changes made necessary
by death or extreme old-age the composition of the Government is the same
as it was four years ago. I can see no good reason for supposing that it
will not be the same four years from now (though the Minister of
Agriculture and the Minister of Industry are both getting a little doddery
and the Minister of Economic Affairs may be sent abroad as an
Ambassadors). The orbits in which members of this Government move are
fixed by the rules to which I have referred.

8. The more important Thai leaders are worth
considering individually. The one with whom I have had most to do has been
the Foreign Minister, Colonel Thanat Khoman [ถนัด
คอมันตร์, 1914 - ]. In spite of his
prefix he is not a military man but a diplomat, the son of a judge and
with Chinese blood in his veins. He is quite comfortably off and has a
rich wife. He retains his position principally through the protection of
the King, who began to take an interest in him a year or two ago, as well
as through his unquestioned abilities. He is also on good terms with the
Prime Minister. But he is vain, touchy and disputatious. Most of his
colleagues in the Government dislike him for his intellectual arrogance
and because he lets everybody including themselves know that he despises
them. He keeps everything to himself and is beastly to his subordinates.
He sees himself as the great anti-appeaser, the spiritual descendant of
the opponents of Munich to the lessons of which he continually refers. Any
allusion to peace talks in Viet-Nam makes him shiver. He is a strong
adherent of the American alliance and supporter of American policies,
though his attitude towards the United States is qualified by xenophobia
and the Americans find him difficult to handle. He is a vigorous promoter
of all forms of regional co-operation. I think he is ambitious and would
like to be Prime Minister one day and I feel fairly confident that the
King sees him in this light. But without the backing of the King, and for
the time being at any rate of the Prime Minister, he would soon be cast
aside. There are some who think that he has already steered his country
too far away from the traditional Thai policy of non-involvement for his
own future good and that retribution will one day overtake him. His
obsessions about liberals , about the French and about Cambodia sometimes
make one wonder whether he is altogether sane. But he is not entirely
repulsive. He quite likes the British, indeed he worked with us in the
war, but he regrets our present weakness and our tendency to appeasement
as he sees it.

9. There are two other civilians worth mentioning
who can be expected to play important parts in their country's future. One
of these is Nai Pote Sarasin [พจน์ สารสิน, 1905 - 2000], a former Prime
Minister and at present Minister of National Development. The other is Dr.
Puey Ungpakorn [ป๋วย อึ๊งภากรณ์,
1916 - 1999], Governor of the Bank of Thailand. They are both
outstandingly able and between them deserve to share most of the credit
for their country’s present prosperity and for the prospects of
undiminished growth which are plain for all to see. Pote who is almost
pure Chinese is conventionally ambitious and would be willing to perform
almost any political service which the military might ask of him. He is a
very rich man but owes his position mainly to the good grace of the
military and if ever some sort of political party life were to develop he
might emerge as the leader of the Government party or even as Prime
Minister again as the nominee of the military. Dr. Puey who incidentally
has an English wife and a first-class war record is quite a different
type. He is unique in seeming to owe nobody any favours. He has reached
his position by sheer ability and by his well-deserved reputation for
incorruptibility. The strength of the currency is his monument. He is
known for his independence of mind and for his readiness even to criticise
the Government in public if he really feels driven to doing so. But since
he has no special link with the military and is neither well off nor well
born I cannot see him succeeding to the leadership in present
circumstances. He knows his place just as any other Thai does. But my
successor will do well to cultivate him not only for his own sake but also
because if there were some unpredictable convulsion leading to a further
modification of the rules Dr. Puey might be brought forward as a sort of
national saviour. He is the only individual about whom it is possible for
this to be said and he must be conscious of it.

10. Brief mention must be made of Prince Dhani
[พระวรวงศ์เธอ พระองค์เจ้าธานีนิวัต กรมหมื่นพิทยลาภพฤฒิยากร, 1885 - 1974],
President of the Privy Council and one of the only scholars in this
lowbrow country. Over 80 and of an amiability bordering on
feeble-mindedness he is worth considering for what he represents. He is
the guardian of arcane court lore and the regulator of royal custom and
procedure. The military do not venture into the field over which he
presides. They stand in awe of him without at all resenting him because he
represents the royal principle which they also respect and feel the need
of Prince Dhani will in due course be succeeded by some other old
gentleman whose position will entitle him to the same consideration.

11. The dictatorship is embodied jointly in the two
military leaders, Field-Marshal Thanom Kittikachorn [ถนอม กิตติขจร, 1911 -
2004], Prime Minister and Minister of Defence, and General Prapass
Charusathiana [ประภาส จารุเสถียร,
1912 - 1997], Minister of the Interior and Commander-in-chief of
the Army. The main levers of power, that is to say the army and the
police, are firmly in the hands of General Prapass. But Field-Marshal
Thanom has the backing of the King and enjoys a greater degree of general
popularity and goodwill than does General Prapass, although the latter
also has the common touch. These in simple terms are the factors that for
a number of years have made it convenient to this rather ill-assorted pair
to work in harness. They are quite different one from the other. Thanom is
benevolent, accommodating, cautious, not spectacularly rich, very Thai in
appearance and manner. Prapass is a gambler, rough and decisive, he and
his wife have accumulated a fortune (though not on the Sarit [สฤษดิ์
ธนะรัชต์, 1908 - 1963]scale) and he looks and would if necessary act like
a Japanese war lord. Prapass does not carry quite enough general goodwill
to topple Thanom and Thanom is not quite strong enough to dispense with
Prapass. Their alliance of convenience was sealed some time ago by a
marriage between their children. Stories of political plots to take over
the Government used before my time to form one of the main subjects of
Bangkok conversation. And when I first came here there were still some
going around. They are never heard now. The fact is that there is no other
officer or policeman in sight who can aspire to be the rival of either of
these two. And anyway the days of the coup d'etat are probably over for
good. Material considerations apart anyone who attempted a coup d’etat
would certainly incur the displeasure of the King as well perhaps as being
deterred by the fear of arousing the ridicule of foreigners. Changes at
the top can now only be made by arrangement. Both Thanom and Prapass are
in good health (Prapass’ eye trouble is no worse than General de Gaulle’s)
and there is no reason why the duumvirate should not continue for a long
time to come. It is not a vigorous administration and there are some who
regret the days of Sarit. The machine works slowly. Few decisions of
importance are taken below the level of the Cabinet for the reasons I have
mentioned above. The Prime Minister takes a long time to make up his mind
about anything and Cabinet meetings are bywords for tedium. But for all
that the system administered by Thanom and Prapass seems to suit the
present requirements of Bangkok fairly well and there is no obvious
substitute at hand.

12. There is at present an interim Constitution in
force of an openly authoritarian character. A constituent assembly was
appointed in 1959 with the task of drafting a permanent Constitution and
they have been at it ever since. The official theory is that the draft
will be completed in time to be presented to the King on his 40th birthday
next December. If this happens then the situation in the north-east or the
international situation could still be used as an excuse for postponing
the elections which should in theory follow the promulgation of the
Constitution by the King at an interval of six or nine months. Elections
would present a problem to Thanom and Prapass. There would presumably have
to be a Government party to win them but this would have first to be got
going and somebody would have to be appointed its leader. Attempts have
been made during the last year or so to organise some sort of party life
but they have run into the sand. And Thanom, Prapass and Pote have each of
them at one time or another and with a greater or lesser degree of
disingenuousness disclaimed any desire to be the leader of a Government
party although there is no other very obvious person who could do it. The
fact is that almost nobody in Thailand is interested in the idea of party
politics in the sense in which these are understood in the West. There
have been political parties as well as elections in the past in Thailand
but they have been artificial affairs. I have only met two Thais, one a
constitutional lawyer and the other the discredited leader of the defunct
" democratic party " who have shown any signs of sincerity in expressing
the hope for constitutional development. Some Thais pay lip-service to the
idea in the hearing of foreigners because they think it is what they ought
to do. But even the rather phoney elder statesman Prince Wan who is
chairman of the constitutional commission occupied with drawing up the new
Constitution, although greatly enjoying the intricate arguments which
accompany his work, seems not to be remotely disturbed by the thought that
it may never be completed or that if completed may never be put into use.
He is quite cynical in his conversation on the subject and anyway he is
himself on the side of the generals. One wonders therefore what all the
fuss is about. If the Thais on the whole content with the present system
why do the authorities continue to bother about a new Constitution in
which nobody is interested? I think it is because they feel rightly or
wrongly that the outside world and in particular the Americans expect them
to modernise their political institutions as they are modernising their
economic and (to a much lesser extent) their social institutions. I am
sure that the King feels this strongly. Moreover, neighbouring countries,
including even South Viet-Nam in the middle of its war, have parliaments
and elections of a kind. The Thais must feel that comparisons are being
drawn by foreigners to their disadvantage. They mind a great deal about
what foreigners think of them, though they resent any interference by
foreigners and I am sure that the United States Government has never put
any direct pressure on them in this matter. Why should it want to? The
Thais of course attach great importance to forms. They might therefore
genuinely feel more comfortable if it could be made to appear that they
were governed in what passes for an up-to-date way even though it might
not really suit them and they had no genuine desire for it. Everybody who
is not a manual labourer in Bangkok now possesses and often wears a dark
European-style suit and tie when white clothes or even a panung would suit
local requirements much better. The move towards a Constitution and
elections is a similar phenomenon.

13. If progress consists in producing and consuming
more goods then the progress made by the Thais during the last few years
has been spectacular and there are no signs of the pace slowing down.
During the period of the last Five-year Plan just ended the average annual
rate of growth has been 7 per cent. During the period of the next
Five-year Plan it is expected to be 8,5 per cent. Allowing for the growth
in population at the current rate of 3,3 per cent (higher than the Indian
rate) the average income per capita, so the planners calculate, will go up
by about 35 per cent by the end of the period. Of course this will not be
evenly shared since merchants will get more than civil servants and city
dwellers will get more than peasants. But most will get some of it. Not
only is the output of rice expected to increase considerably but so is
that of almost every other crop including even that of rubber in spite of
the low price it now fetches on the world market. The relative importance
of agriculture will nevertheless decline. It is expected that by 1971 the
value of Thailand’s industrial output will be more than half the value of
its agricultural output. Twice as many ships now call at Bangkok as did 10
years ago. The foreign currency reserves are enough to pay for 14 months'
imports. The Thais have no difficulty in attracting investment from abroad
and foreign businessmen and investors need have no fear of being unable to
remit their profits. The International Bank has described Thailand as "the
perfect debtor ".

14. Against this background of political stability
in Bangkok and of unremitting economic expansion it seems to me a mistake
to make much of the acts of banditry and terrorism which continue to
plague the inhabitants of some limited areas in the north-east and in the
south, though these are what mostly interest foreign journalists. The "
subversive threat " is on a very small scale. Even Prapass in whose
interest it lies to exaggerate the threat has estimated the number of "
terrorists " under arms as not more than 1,300 in the whole country
(population 31 million rising to 37 million in 1971). The authorities are
certainly slow in reducing the threat to entirely negligible proportions
as with a little more energy, better organisation and some more special
equipment including in particular helicopters and communications equipment
they could quite easily do. The Americans are now providing much of the
equipment that is needed. But the Thai authorities are lazy, they are not
used to deploying soldiers and policemen in remote areas, the rival
intelligence organisations are uncoordinated and jealous of each other,
and the whole thing is expensive. And so it drags on and catches the
headlines whenever a village headman is murdered or a forced propaganda
meeting is held in a village, and the Americans with memories of Viet-Nam
in 1958 get downcast. But so long as there is no collapse of the American
position in the rest of Indo-China, and so long as the trained
infiltrators from China, North Viet-Nam and Laos are numbered as they now
are only in handfuls, it would be absurd to get too worried about this
little rash on the healthy body of Thailand. The Thai Communist Party can
scarcely be said to exist and such as it is is becoming more and more
vulnerable to penetration. There is no indigenous Communist menace. The
regime is more likely to be troubled in years to come by the discontent
which normally beset a city that grows too fast, proletarianised
country-boys and educated or semi-educated unemployed. But these troubles
are a long way off and will have nothing directly to do with communism or
China.

15. Practically all Thais however genuinely feel
menaced by China. Though they have successfully assimilated most of the
Chinese in their midst their bones are chilled by the thought of this vast
country almost on their doorstep outnumbering them by twenty times, soon
to possess effective thermonuclear weapons and apparently gone quite mad.
For as long as can be foreseen they will therefore cling to their American
protectors. There is no division of opinion about the need to do this.
There are only different degrees of regret that it should be necessary
since it is contrary to their tradition to depend upon one ally and before
the Japanese came in 1941 they had never for long willingly allowed a
foreign Power to implant its presence among them. So they hope that the
Americans will go away one day when the world is safer. But they are not
likely to want to dispense with the American presence before that day
comes, unless they decide that it attracts more perils that it averts.
This they might be inclined to think if the American resolve to maintain
South Viet-Nam in the American sphere of influence were to weaken. The
Thais do not see their country as a forward bastion of the " free world ".
They prefer to be well behind the battlements at a safe distance. They
want the Americans to intensify the war in Viet-Nam and peace talk makes
them nervous. Moreover the Viet-Namese are their old enemies as the
Chinese are not. They are therefore quite glad to see North Viet-Nam being
destroyed though they do not say so aloud. The horrors of the war do not
move them. The fact that they are perpetrated by white men on Asians makes
no difference. Thus I believe in the application of the domino theory to
Thailand in the sense that the Thais would not willingly allow the
Americans simply to fall back behind their borders. If there was any
question of falling back the Thais would probably change course with
alacrity and seek some new and less committed status. They would not "go
Communist " whatever that means and it is quite possible that the same
individuals, including even Thanat, might in such an event lead Thailand
along a path very similar to the one followed by the much abused Prince
Sihanouk [នរោត្តម សីហនុ, 1922 -
2012].

16. But none of this is likely to happen since the
Americans are unlikely to relax their grip on Viet-Nam. Speculation on the
subject is therefore perhaps rather pointless. What is more to the point
is to try to estimate how long, assuming that there is no great change in
circumstances outside Thailand, the Thais are going to tolerate the
undoubted affront to their national self-respect represented by the
presence of so many thousands of Americans sprawling all over the five
great air bases, breathing down their necks in every corner of their
Administration, pushing up the rents and corrupting the girls. There has
been a faint murmur about this ever since I have been here and it has
grown a little louder lately. In the course of their history the Thais
have more than once suddenly rounded on the presumptuous foreigner. The
idea of Thais being always gentle and patient is only valid up to a point.
They are given to explosions of anger and the most appalling crimes of
violence are recorded daily in the Press. My French colleague who has been
here for eight years expects a sudden revulsion against the Americans at
any moment. It is true that it was only with extreme reluctance that the
Thai Government recently acknowledged what everyone knew about the use
being made by the Americans of Thai bases for bombing Viet-Nam and that
this was because it disliked admitting that the Americans were using Thai
soil as a convenience and because it did not wish the record of its
involvement with the Americans to be unambiguously clear. But I think M.
Clarac’s [Achille Clarac, 1903 - 1999] judgment is due to wishful
thinking. My own view is that the Thais will tolerate the American
presence in its existing form for just as long as it seems necessary to
keep the Chinese and Viet-Namese enemies as far away from Thailand as
possible.

[...]

18. One of our assets here is that a large
proportion of the ruling class has been educated in England. The tradition
of English education goes back a long way and shows few signs of
declining. The King is having his only son educated in England because he
believes strongly that all Thai youth is in need of the kind of discipline
which only our schools can provide. In terms of actual numbers more Thais
now go to the United States than to England mainly because there is more
money available for scholarships. But most Thais would send their children
to England for preference.

[...]

19. I have very much enjoyed living for a while in
Thailand. One would have to be very insensitive or puritanical to take the
view that the Thais had nothing to offer. It is true that they have no
literature, no painting and only a very odd kind of music, that their
sculpture, their ceramics and their dancing are borrowed from others and
that their architecture is monotonous and their interior decoration
hideous. Nobody can deny that gambling and golf are the chief pleasures of
the rich and that licentiousness is the main pleasure of them all. But it
does a faded European good to spend some time among such a jolly,
extrovert and antiintellectual people. And if anybody wants to know what
their culture consists of the answer is that it consists of themselves,
their excellent manners, their fastidious habits, their graceful gestures
and their elegant persons. If we are elephants and oxen they are gazelles
and butterflies. On the other hand I am glad not to be staying here longer
because I am certain that the deterioration in my mental processes is due
not only to the onset of old age but more particularly to the enervating
effects of the climate which no amount of exercise and air-conditioning
can nullify.

[...]

21. I am sending copies of this despatch to Her
Majesty’s Ambassador at Vientiane and to the Political Adviser to the
Commander-in-Chief Far East at Singapore.

"Chartchai Chionoi
a.k.a. Chartchai Laemfapha (Thai: ชาติชาย เชี่ยวน้อย; born
October 10, 1942 in Pathum Wan (ปทุมวัน)
District Bangkok, Thailand as Naris Chionoi) is a former
professional Thai boxer and WBC World champion in Flyweight
division.

Professional career

Chartchai Chionoi was the
second ever World Champion from Thailand, following his Idol Pone
Kingpetch (โผน กิ่งเพชร).
Unlike most Thai fighters, Chartchai was never involved in Muay Thai
(มวยไทย)
unlike so many other professional boxers
from Thailand.

Chartchai Chionoi turned
pro on March 27, 1959 with a second round knockout victory over
Somsak Kritsanasuwan. Chionoi would go 7-0-1 in his first 8 pro
fights, a 6 round draw against Sala Kampuch the only blemish. In his
9th professional fight, Chionoi would lose a 6 round decision to
Singtong Por Tor, Chionoi would avenge this lose 5 years later with
a 10 round decision victory.

Chartchai travelled to
Japan for his next 11 fights, going 8 and 3 in the process. All
three of his loses were by 10 round decision, including a loss at
the hands of the reigning OPBF Jr. Featherweight Champion Haruo
Sakamoto. The other two fighters that defeat Chionoi during this
time, Mitsunori Seki and Akira Oguchi, would go on to lose rematches
to Chionoi in the future.

After fighting in Japan
for a year, Chionoi returned to his native Thailand for his next 4
fights, winning 3 of 4, his only loss to Ernesto Miranda would later
by avenged.

On September 22, 1962 in
Quezon City in the Philippines, Chionoi would face Primo Famiro for
the vacant OPBF Flyweight Title. Chionoi decisioned Famiro over 12
rounds to capture the vacant title. In July of the following year,
Chionoi would lose the OPBF Flyweight Title in his first defence,
dropping a decision to Tsuyoshi Nakamura in Osaka, Japan. Nakamura
would go on to make 10 successful defences of the OPBF Title, before
finally losing it in October 1969.

Chartchai Chionoi would go
19-2-1 over the next three years to earn his first World Title shot.
During that stretch Chionoi won a 10 round decision over former WBA
& WBC Flyweight Champion Salvatore Burruni. Burruni had captured his
World Title's by defeating Chionoi's predecessor Pone Kingpetch in
April 1965.

On December 30, 1966
Chartchai Chionoi challenged WBC Flyweight Champion Walter McGowan.
Chionoi would stop McGowan in the 9th round to capture his first
World Title. Chionoi would make four successful title defences
during this first reign as champion, including victories over
McGowan in their rematch, Efren Torres and future WBA Flyweight
Champion Bernabe Villacampo.

On February 23, 1969
Chionoi would lose his title to Efren Torres in a rematch. The fight
was stopped in the 8th round because Chionoi's left eye had swollen
shut. Chionoi would win two out of three fights to earn a rematch
with Efren Torres. In March 1970 in front of over 40,000 of his
countrymen, Chionoi would win a 15 round unanimous decision over
Torres in their rubber match, to once again claim the WBC Flyweight
Title. Chionoi won by scores of 148-142, 147-144 and 145-141. The
second title reign of Chartchai Chionoi would be short lived, in his
first title defence Chionoi would be knocked out by Erbito
Salavarria in the second round. Salavarria would go on to make
several successful title defences before losing the WBC Flyweight
Title, he would later reign as WBA Flyweight Champion as well.

Undeterred by losing the
WBC Flyweight Title for a second time, Chionoi would go undefeated
in his next 6 fights to secure a title shot against long time WBA
Flyweight Champion Masao Ohba (大場 政夫). On
January 2, 1973 Chionoi would face off against Ohba in a very
memorable fight. Chionoi put Ohba on the canvas early, but the
champion would rebound and stop Chionoi in the 12th round.
Tragically Ohba would die in an auto accident 22 days after this
fight. As a result of this tragic event, Chionoi would be paired
against Fritz Chervet in May 1973 for the vacant title. Chionoi
would knock out Chervet in the 5th round to capture his third World
Flyweight Title.

Two successful defences of
his WBA Flyweight Title would follow, before Chionoi would lose his
title on the scales in October 1974. Despite being stripped of the
title, Chartchai Chionoi would still fight Susumu Hanagata in a
fight that was for the vacant WBA Flyweight Title, at least on
Hanagata's part. Susumu Hanagata would stop Chionoi in the 6th round
to walk away the WBA Flyweight Champion.

After losing his third
World title, Chionoi would win a 10 round decision over Willie
Asuncion, then suffer a knockout loss to Rodolfo Francis in August
1975. Chartchai Chionoi would retire from boxing after the loss to
Francis, finishing with a career record of 61-18-3 (36).

Retirement

Chionoi is now living a very comfortable life in
retirement with his wife of over 45 years Oot, spending as much time
as possible with their four children. Despite some lasting ill
effects from his years as a boxer, Chionoi only has fond memories of
his career, and lives with no regrets."

"Progress
in all countries, particularly the less developed, depends
substantially upon examples set by traditional leaders; unless they
show the way, change by ordinary farmers becomes doubly difficult.
So often in Asia hereditary elite are content with the old order or
simply leave the land to join the new urbanites. Mom Chao SITHIPORN,
instead, chose to leave high position, devoting his life and fortune
to introducing agricultural methods new to the then Kingdom of Siam.

A grandson of King Mongkut
and nephew of King Chulalongkorn, Mom Chao SITHIPORN grew up at a
time when these vigorous monarchs were opening Thailand to foreign
contact. Sent to England for schooling, he studied engineering. Upon
return to Bangkok he first engaged in private business and later
joined the civil service, rising in 13 years to the highest rank.

To relieve the routine of
his official position he began to study agriculture. Increasingly
convinced that other crops than rice should be encouraged, he
decided to engage in farming. Also, he had married a noble lady
reared in the Royal Household and felt her frail health could only
be remedied by life in the open. Family opposition was overcome when
his cousin, King Vajiravadh, gave the couple permission to leave and
make their own life.

At Bangberd (บางเบิด),
some 400 kilometers south of Bangkok, Mom Chao SITHIPORN in 1921
acquired 40 hectares of uncultivated upland and set out to prove
with scientific management that a farm could be both a place to
produce and to live. Contouring, terracing, and green manuring of
fields and interplanting of crops were first seen in Thailand on his
farm. Watermelons, flue-cured Virginia tobacco and improved corn—now
Thailand's third largest export—were among the new crops he
promoted, demonstrating use of fertilizer and insecticides. The
earliest Thai advocate of diversified farming, he was the first to
breed and sell purebred swine and, with imported strains of
high-yielding layers, to set up a commercial poultry operation. In
his garden were vegetable-s uncommon to his country. His wife
applied modern methods of preserving food. On no Thai farm before
had records and cost accounts been kept. Experimenting with
Thailand's first tractor and many other laborsaving devices, he was
his own mechanic.

Educator and researcher
more than simple farmer, he helped neighbors follow his practices
and offered his seeds. Young agriculturists in government became his
ardent admirers. To share more widely his findings he founded
Kasikorn, still the only agricultural journal in Thailand.
Associates in this venture were graduates of the College of
Agriculture at Los Baños in the Philippines.

Recalled to Bangkok in
1932, Mom Chao SITHIPORN served briefly as Director General of the
Department of Agriculture. A lasting contribution was establishment
of the first three upland experiment stations. Deposed by the coup
d'état ending absolute monarchy and imprisoned as a Royalist, he was
incarcerated mainly on Taratao Island (ตะรุเตา)
for 11 years. For fellow inmates he gave lectures on upland farming
which were later incorporated in a book. Released near the end of
World War II, he was elected to Parliament from his home province
and served as Minister of Agriculture for a short period until he
was again deposed by a coup. A notable achievement was his vigorous
attack on rinderpest. As head of the Thai delegation, he was elected
Chairman of the FAO Rice Commission for three successive sessions.

His fortune exhausted but
his spirit unbroken, Mom Chao SITHIPORN and his wife returned to
reopen their Bangberd farm. Finding it more than they could manage,
it was sold in 1960 and a two hectare plot purchased near Hua Hin (หัวหิน).
There the Prince continues to grow vegetables, grapes and other
fruits. Now 84 years of age, he maintains an active correspondence
with agriculturists. In articles to newspapers, he vigorously
defends the interests of Thai farmers, critically challenging
government policies with the pragmatism of a man who knows the soil.

In
electing His Serene Highness, Prince SITHIPORN KRIDAKARA to receive
the 1967 Ramon Magsaysay Award for Public Service, the Board of
Trustees recognizes his nearly half a century of pioneering
experimentation and education devoted to advancement of Thai
agriculture."

"Even before all elements
of the Royal Thai Volunteer Regiment had arrived in Vietnam, efforts
were being made to increase again the size of the Thai contribution.
By mid-1967 the Thai government had unilaterally begun consideration
of the deployment of additional forces to South Vietnam. On 8
September the Thai government submitted a request for extensive
military assistance to the American Embassy at Bangkok. Specific
items in the request were related directly to the provision of an
additional army force for South Vietnam. The Thai Prime Minister
proposed a one-brigade group at a strength of 10,800 men. This
organization was to be composed of three infantry battalions, one
artillery battalion, one engineer battalion, and other supporting
units as required.

In an apparently related move, meanwhile, the chairman of the joint
Chiefs had requested the joint General Staff to assess the Thai
military situation. This assessment was to include a review of the
security situation in Thailand, the military organization, and the
ability of the Thais to send additional troops to South Vietnam. In
turn the joint General Staff asked for the views of the US Military
Assistance Command, Thailand, not later than 20 September 1967
concerning Thai capability. The Joint Staff wished to know how long
it would take the Thai government to provide the following troop
levels, including necessary supporting troops, to Vietnam: 5,000
troops (approximately two infantry battalions, reinforced); 15,000
troops (approximately four infantry battalions, reinforced); 20,000
or more troops (approximately eight infantry battalions, reinforced,
or more). The staff also wanted to know the effect that furnishing
troops at each level would have on Thai internal security.

The commander of the US Military
Assistance Command, Thailand, Major General Hal D. McCown, concluded that the
Royal Thai Army could provide a 5,000-man force without incurring an
unacceptable risk to Thailand's internal security. He also believed it possible
for Thailand to deploy a 10,000-man (two-brigade) force, but the organization,
training, and deployment had to be incremental to allow the Royal Thai Army to
recover from the deployment of one brigade. In addition, he held that it was
impractical to attempt to raise a force of 15,000 or larger because of the
probable attrition of the training base. In forming the Royal Thai Army
Volunteer Regiment, the Thai Army had drawn 97 percent of its men from existing
units, despite the talk of maximizing the use of volunteers. There was every
indication that it would follow the same pattern in providing additional forces
to South Vietnam. Such a draw-down by the Royal Thai Army of its limited number
of trained men was acceptable for a force of 5,000 and marginally acceptable for
10,000, but unacceptable for a force greater than 10,000.

With these comments as a basis,
Admiral Sharp went back to the joint Chiefs with his recommendation, which
stated:

Present negotiations with
the Thais have centered around a deployment of a total 10,000 man force. CINCPAC
concurs that this is probably the largest force the Thais could provide without
incurring an unacceptable sacrifice in the trained base of the Thai Army and
accepting more than undue risk insofar as the Thais' ability to effectively
counter the present insurgency.

Concurrently, General Westmoreland was
being queried on the ability of the United States to support the various troop
levels under consideration. In making this appraisal he assumed that MACV would
have to provide maintenance support for all new equipment not in the Thai Army
inventory and all backup support above division and brigade level, including
direct support units. Other maintenance requirements, such as organic support,
including supply distribution, transportation, and service functions, the Thais
would handle. In considering the various force levels he envisioned a
brigade-size force (5,000 men) that would be attached to a US division for
support. As such, the support command of the parent US division would require a
minimum augmentation of 50 men to provide for the additional maintenance
requirements. Attaching a force of 10,000 men or more to a US division would be
impractical. A US support battalion-approximately 600 men, including a
headquarters company, a maintenance and support company, a reinforced medical
company, and a transportation truck company- would be required for direct
support of a Thai force of that size. A Thai force of 15,000 to 20,000 would
also need a special support command, including a headquarters company, a medical
company, a supply and transport company, and a division maintenance battalion.
The estimated strength of this command would be 1,000 to 1,200 men, requiring an
increase in general support troops.

At that time there were no US combat
service support units available in Vietnam to meet such requirements. Alternate
methods for obtaining additional support units were to readjust forces within
approved force ceilings, to increase civilian substitution in military spaces,
or to increase the US force ceiling. Any attempt to provide logistical support
for the Thai forces within the existing troop ceiling would have to be at the
expense of US combat troops. Thus, General Westmoreland considered an increase
in the US force ceiling the only practical course of action."

"Following a series of
small unilateral and larger combined operations with Vietnamese
units, the Thai regiment launched Operation NARASUAN in October
1967. In this, their first large-scale separate operation, the Thai
troops assisted in the pacification of the Nhon Trach District of
Bien Hoa Province and killed 145 of the enemy. The Thai soldier was
found to be a resourceful and determined fighting man who displayed
a great deal of pride in his profession. In addition to
participating in combat operations, the Thai units were especially
active in civic action projects within their area of responsibility.
During Operation NARASUAN the Thais built a hospital, constructed 48
kilometers of new roads, and treated nearly 49,000 civilian patients
through their medical units."

James Dalton, Accelerated Rural
Development (ARD) Adviser: The relationship of economic development to
couterinsurgency:

"There
is virtually no evidence available to support the commonly accepted
theory that economic development can counter an insurgency....

The notion that one ought to attempt to satisfy
the villagers’ expectations is probably sound, but are we justified
in assuming that those expectations are primarily economic? I
believe that the Thai villager is looking for a measure of security,
of which economic security is just one aspect and is not necessarily
at the top of the list."

"In response to a request
by Major General Hirunsiri Cholard, Director of Operations, Royal
Thai Army, and with the backing of the American Ambassador in
Bangkok, Graham Martin, bilateral discussions began on 3 November
1967 concerning the organization for the Thai add-on force. General
Westmoreland gave the following guidance. The missions assigned to
the force would be the same type as the missions being assigned to
the Royal Thai Army Volunteer Regiment. The area of employment would
be generally the same. Reconnaissance elements should be heavy on
long-range reconnaissance patrolling. Because of terrain limitations
the units should not have tanks. Armored personnel carriers should
be limited to the number required to lift the rifle elements of four
rifle companies and should not exceed forty-eight. The use of
organic medium artillery should be considered; 4.2-inch mortars are
not recommended. An organic signal company should be included. The
force should consist of at least six battalions of infantry with
four companies each. There should be no organic airmobile companies;
support will be provided by US aviation units. There should be one
engineer company per brigade.

General Westmoreland's
interest in whether the force would be two separate brigades or a
single force was also brought up in the discussion that followed. On
this point General Cholard replied that the guidance from his
superiors was emphatic-the force should be a single self-sufficient
force with one commander."

"The US Ambassador to
Thailand, Mr. Martin, established additional guidelines. On 9
November 1967 he advised the Thai government by letter of the action
the US government was prepared to take to assist in the deployment
of additional Thai troops to South Vietnam and to improve the
capability of the Royal Thai armed forces in Thailand. In substance
the United States agreed to

Fully equip and provide
logistical support for the forces going to South Vietnam. The
equipment would be retained by the Royal Thai government upon
final withdrawal of Thai forces from South Vietnam.

Assume the cost of
overseas allowance at the rates now paid by the US government to
the Royal Thai Army Volunteer Regiment in South Vietnam.

Provide equipment and
consumables for rotational training in an amount sufficient to
meet the agreed requirements of forces in training for deployment;
and undertake the repair and rehabilitation of facilities required
for such rotational training. The equipment would be retained by
the Royal Thai government following the final withdrawal of Thai
forces from South Vietnam.

Assume additional costs
associated with the preparation, training, maintenance, equipment
transportation, supply and mustering out of the additional forces
to be sent to South Vietnam.

Assist in maintaining
the capability and in accelerating the modernization of the Royal
Thai armed forces-including the additional helicopters and other
key items-as well as increase to $75 million both the Military
Assistance Program for fiscal year 1968 and the program planning
for 1969.

Deploy to Thailand a
Hawk battery manned by US personnel to participate in the training
of Thai troops to man the battery. Provide the Thai government
with equipment for the battery and assume certain costs associated
with the battery's deployment.

Further discussion between US Military
Assistance Command representatives of Vietnam and Thailand set a force size
between 10,598 and 12,200 for consideration. As a result of suggestions from the
commander of the US Military Assistance Command, Thailand, General McCown, and
General Westmoreland, the Thai representatives began to refer to the add-on
force as a division. The Royal Thai Army asked for the following revisions to
the US concept for the organization of the division: add a division artillery
headquarters; revise the reconnaissance squadron to consist of three platoons of
mechanized troops and one long-range reconnaissance platoon (the US concept was
one mechanized troop and two reconnaissance platoons); add one antiaircraft
battalion with eighteen M42's, organized for a ground security role; add a
separate replacement company, which would carry the 5 percent overstrength of
the division; upgrade the medical unit from a company to a battalion; and
upgrade the support unit from a battalion to a group.

The last two requests were designed to
upgrade ranks. General Westmoreland had two exceptions to the proposed
revisions: first, three mechanized troops were acceptable but the total number
of APC's should not exceed forty-eight; and second, MACV would provide the
antiaircraft ground security support through each field force. The M42's would
not be authorized.

As the conference in Bangkok
continued, general agreement was reached on the training and deployment of the
Thai division. The first of two increments would comprise 59 percent of the
division and consist of one brigade headquarters, three infantry battalions, the
engineer battalion minus one company, the reconnaissance squadron minus one
mechanized troop, division artillery headquarters, one 105-mm. howitzer
battalion, one 155mm. howitzer battery, and necessary support, including a slice
of division headquarters. The cadre training was tentatively scheduled to begin
on 22 January 1968 with deployment to begin on 15 July 1968. The second
increment would then consist of the second brigade headquarters, three infantry
battalions, one engineer company, one mechanized troop, the second 105-mm.
howitzer battalion, the 155-mm. howitzer battalion minus one battery, and
necessary support, including the remainder of the division headquarters.
Assuming the dates for the first increment held true, the second increment would
begin training on 5 August 1968 and deploy on 27 January 1969."

"The Dalai Lama touches his sun cap in farewell to
New Zealand commenting that the folk are nice and that he liked the range of
hats. Behind him is the Beehive on top of which stand Helen Clark, Prime
Minister, Leader of the National Party, John Key and Minister of Foreign
Affairs, Winston Peters. All of them are waving goodbye."

[Quelle von Text und Bild:
Dalai Lama. "Nice folk....lovely
range of hats." 21 June, 2007.. Webb, Murray, 1947- :[Digital caricatures
published from 29 July 2005 onwards (2006, 2007, 2008). Includes a selection
of digital caricatures published from 2002 and up to July 2005.]. Ref:
DCDL-0003484. Alexander Turnbull Library, Wellington, New Zealand.
http://natlib.govt.nz/records/22889822. -- Zugriff am 2013-03-09. --
"You can copy this item for personal use, share it, and post it on a blog or
website. It cannot be used commercially without permission"]

"With 1968, a new phase is now
starting. We have reached an important point when the end begins now to come
into view.

What is this third phase we are about to enter?

In Phase III, in 1968, we intend to
do the following:

Help the Vietnamese Armed Forces to
continue improving their effectiveness.

Decrease our advisers in training
centers and other places where the professional competence of Vietnamese
officers make this possible.

Increase our advisory effort with
the younger brothers of the Vietnamese Army: the Regional Forces and Popular
Forces.

Use U.S. and free-world forces to
destroy North Vietnamese forays while we assist the Vietnamese to reorganize
for territorial security.

Provide the new military equipment to revitalize the Vietnamese
Army and prepare it to take on an ever-increasing share of the
war.

Continue pressure on North to
prevent rebuilding and to make infiltration more costly.

Turn a major share of frontline DMZ
defense over to the Vietnamese Army.

Increase U.S. support in the rich
and populated delta.

Help the Government of Viet-Nam
single out and destroy the Communist shadow government.

Continue to isolate the guerrilla
from the people.

Help the new Vietnamese government
to respond to popular aspirations and to reduce and eliminate corruption.

Help the Vietnamese strengthen their
policy forces to enhance law and order.

Open more roads and canals.

Continue to improve the Vietnamese
economy and standard of living.

Now for phase IV the final phase.
That period will see the conclusion of our plan to weaken the enemy and
strengthen our friends until we become progressively superfluous. The
object will be to show the world that guerrilla warfare and invasion do not
pay as a new means of Communist aggression.

I see phase IV happening as follows:

Infiltration will slow.

The Communist infrastructure will be
cut up and near collapse.

The Vietnamese Government will prove
its stability, and the Vietnamese Army will show that it can handle Viet
Cong.

The Regional Forces and Popular
Forces will reach a higher level of professional performance.

U.S. units can begin to phase down
as the Vietnamese Army is modernized and develops its capacity to the
fullest.

The military physical assets, bases
and ports, will be progressively turned over to the Vietnamese.

The Vietnamese will take charge of
the final mopping up of the Viet Cong (which will probably last several
years).

The U.S., at the same time, will continue the developmental help
envisaged by the President for the community of Southeast Asia.

You may ask how long phase III will
take, before we reach the final phase. We have already entered part of
phase III. Looking back on phases I and II, we can conclude that we have
come a long way.

I see progress as I travel over
Viet-Nam.

I see it in the attitudes of the
Vietnamese.

I see it in the open roads and
canals.

I see it in the new crops and the
new purchasing power of the farmer.

I see it in the increasing
willingness of the Vietnamese Army to fight North Vietnamese units and in
the victories they are winning.

Parenthetically, I might say that
the U.S. press tends to report U.S. actions, so you may not be as aware as I
am of the victories won by South Vietnamese forces.

The enemy has many problems

He is losing control of the
scattered population under his influence.

He is losing credibility with the
population he still controls.

He is alienating the people by his
increased demands and taxes, where he can impose them.

He sees the strength of his forces
steadily declining.

He can no longer recruit in the
South to any meaningful extent; he must plug the gap with North Vietnamese.

His monsoon offensives have been
failures. . . .

Lastly, the Vietnamese Army is on
the road to becoming a competent force . . . .

We are making progress. We know you
want an honorable and early transition to the fourth and last phase. So do
your sons and so do I.

It lies within our grasp -- the
enemy's hopes are bankrupt. With your support we will give you a success
that will impact not only on South Viet-Nam but on every emerging nation in
the world."

"Work continued on the
new Thai force structure and another goal was met when a briefing
team from US Military Assistance Command, Thailand, presented on 28
November 1967 the proposed Thai augmentation force and advisory
requirements to General Creighton B. Abrams, then Deputy Commander,
US Military Assistance Command, Vietnam. The basic organization was
approved and representatives from both MACV and US Army, Vietnam,
returned to Thailand with the briefing team to assist in developing
the new tables of organization and equipment and allowances.
Concurrently, action was taken to initiate funding for table of
organization and construction needs in order to meet the training
and deployment dates agreed upon earlier. "

Abb.:
Soldiers of the Royal Thai Army Volunteer Regiment (Queen's Cobras) conduct
a search and sweep mission in Phuoc Tho, 1967-11[Bildquelle: Wikipedia.
-- Public domain]

1967-11

Es erscheint

Lomax, Louis E. (Emanuel) <1922 - 1970>: Thailand : the war that is, the war that will be. -- New
York : Vintage Books, 1967. -- 175 S. ; 19
cm. -- (Vintage book ; V-204). -- "The first-hand report of another Viet Nam
in the making". -- "Louis Emanuel Lomax (August 16, 1922 – July
30, 1970) was an African-American journalist and author. He was also the
first African-American television journalist." "Lomax was a supporter of
several civil rights organizations, including the Congress of Racial
Equality (CORE), the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC),
and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). In 1968, he
signed the "Writers and Editors War Tax Protest" pledge, vowing to
refuse tax payments in protest against U.S. involvement in the Vietnam
War." (Wikipedia)

Abb.: Einbandtitel

"Overhead
there was the almost constant chopping din of American helicopters.
Some of them were ferrying I hai soldiers into the jungles; others
were headed into North Viet Nam to rescue American flyers downed
there. Frequently there was the whining roar of American jets.

What the hell was that!" I demanded. The
Thais who had joined me for dinner were embarrassed; they nervously
lingered their sticky rice and remained-silent.

' Boom!" Again the earth shook and the tables
rattled. If you really want to know what that is," one of my Thai
dinner companions said acidly, "ask the American flyboy you had
dinner with hast night. He is doing it." My Thai interpreter
motioned me to silence. Then he leaned toward me and quietly
explained:

American bombers were returning to their
bases in Thailand after a day of raids over North Viet Nam;
oft-times the Americans were unable to drop all of their bombs, and
rather than run the risk of landing with the

dangerous explosives still aboard, they were
jettisoning them into the jungle belly of Laos. The people of
Nakornpanom [นครพนม] always know when the
American jets are returning; they see a small American plane take
off and then circle high over Laos. The plane is piloted by the
flyboy I had had dinner with; his job is to guide the returning jets
to the spot where they are to unload their bombs.

"Is the area inhabited?" I asked Sing Korn,
my interpreter.

"No," he snapped. "The people have been moved
out. But it is hell on the animals!"

"To the eternal
embarrassment of the American government, which has committed men,
money, and political fortune in the land of Siam, Thailand is a
mean, military
dictatorship, dedicated to the proposition that the function of the
government is to let the people enjoy life so long as they don't
express a desire to participate in the process of government. The
people have no legal rights whatsoever; newspapers are censored and
public gatherings for political purposes are outlawed. Agitation for
free speech and political activity can-and will-get one jailed, or
even shot.

"Your country must have lost
all sense of moral commitment, " a well-educated Thai said to me
privately, "to use Thailand as a base to send bombers aloft in order
to bring freedom to Viet Nam. If America is really committed to
bringing freedom to Southeast Asia, you should start by bombing
Bangkok! "

"Promptly at seven the
following morning Cheon Rachivons knocked at my door.

"I must speak quickly, " he said, unfolding his
prepared statement. "I must hurry to take a helicopter flight into
the jungles. We have just now, a few minutes ago, received word of
Communist activity." I started the tape recorder and handed Cheon
the microphone. He read his statement in the dialect of the
northeast:

"The summary of Communist activity in
Nakornpanom [นครพนม] area: Nakornpanom is an
important major city of northeast Thailand. Right on the border
between Thailand and Laos, with over two hundred kilometers of
common border between the two countries, Nakornpanom consists of
eight amphurs [อำเภอ] [districts] and
three hundred thousand people. The majority of the people are
farmers and rice growers. The main crop of the region is tobacco.

"The people of this area share a common
heritage, similar customs and language, with their Laotian
neighbors. There has been steady and free exchange of trade,
customs, and travel between the two peoples since time immemorial.
The common trait of the people is their kindheartedness and a warm
welcome extended to all visitors, foreign and otherwise. Everyone is
welcome in the true, warm Thai hospitality.

"But now this honor toward others is
beginning to undergo gradual change. This is due to the appearance
of a group of people who are joining a foreign power and inducing
young able-bodied men and women of this town to travel to North Viet
Nam and China for indoctrination in Communist tactics and
insurgency. This includes training in the use of weaponry. Then
these Communist-indoctrinated people return to cause trouble and
sabotage.

"In 1961, about five months before the coup
of Kong Le [ກອງ​ແລ, 1932/34 - 2014] in Laos, there was an operation
conducted here by a Lieutenant Kong Sin [alias Nai Kam], who
operated an insurgency force on both sides of the Mekong River,
between Laos and this town. He belongs to the Laotian Communist
forces [the Pathet Lao] [ປະເທດລາວ]. They set
up their headquarters in Thailand at Bang Nong He and Bankoot. This
Nai [Mister] Kam set up business as a doctor, without the benefit of
a license to practice. He used his doctor’s office as a front; his
real job was to recruit Thai men in the villages and send them to
Hanoi and China for Communist training. He recruited many men, but
we caught him. He is now in jail in Bangkok and his case is before
the Thai courts.

"Soon after Nai Kam was captured, one Nai Yod
Phathisawata appeared on the scene. Nai Yod is now the leader of the
Communist cell. This Nai Yod is a man from the city of Chacheont Sao
[Chachoengsao - ฉะเชิงเทรา], near Bangkok.
He attended a good school in Bangkok called Suan Khlab [โรงเรียนสวนกุหลาบวิทยาลัย].
He has been living in the Na Kae [นาแก] area
district for about twenty years. He also lived in the Communist part
of Laos, Viet Nam, and China. He once managed a sawmill, but now his
business is in the jungles of the mountains where he directs the
insurgents.

"The Communists are all around us, " he
concluded. "We are afraid and concerned. "

Question:

How long do you think it will take to end the insurgency?

Answer: At
least five years, if then.

Question:
How many men does Nai Yod have?

Answer: We
are certain he has at least one hundred hard-core followers with
him in the jungles. We don’t know how many silent supporters he
has in the villages. They farm by day and shoot by night.

Question:
How many men do you have?

Answer:
That is classified information; it cannot be divulged.

The interview was over. Cheon Rachivons stood
impatiently in the middle of the room. "Give him two hundred bahts
[ten dollars], " my Thai interpreter whispered to me. I paid gladly;
not only was the information valuable but I was well aware of
Cheon’s plight: he risks his life daily, he is poorly paid. There
are months when he is not paid at all."

"I
have examined documents and equipment captured by the Thai
government during raids on the camps— some twenty-five hundred
insurgents either surrendered or were captured last year. From
interviews with some of these prisoners a sketchy composite of life
inside their camps can be made.

The
insurgents are organized into bands of about twenty persons. They
live deep in the jungles of the mountains; they sleep on the ground
under plastic tents. The camps are protected by a network of wooden
cowbells strung along bushes about a hundred yards from the center
of each operation. Once a government soldier brushes against these
bushes an ungodly racket is set off, alerting the camp. The
insurgents are armed with a mixture of weapons, from crude bows and
arrows, French rifles left over from the Indo-China conflict, to
American machine guns captured in Viet Nam, as well as guns made in
China, in Russia, and in Czechoslovakia.

The leaders were trained in Communist
countries. They returned to Thailand and set up the organizational
structure, with the old Communist Party as a base. Their hardcore
line is that the "American Imperialists" have taken over Thailand,
that the American government is supporting the Thai government in
its political and economic tyranny over the masses, particularly in
the northeast. The ploy has worked: thousands of young Thais, men
and women, have taken to the hills to join the insurgents.

There is a steady flow of money into their
camps from Hanoi, Peking, and from the Communist underground in
Thailand. The insurgents keep meticulous books; runners are
dispatched into small villages to buy supplies and every purchase is
itemized. The big items are transistor radios, batteries, and dogs.
These captured expense accounts tell volumes:

Much of their time is spent listening to
anti-Thai government diatribes from Radio Hanoi (three hours a day)
and Radio Peking (seven hours each week). The purchase of dogs
indicates that Vietnamese are involved; Vietnamese eat dogs, Thais
don’t.

By day the young recruits are given courses
in Marxism, Maoism, and guerrilla warfare. Their textbooks are
simple tablets written in Thai by hand. They live mainly on rice
stolen from or given by terrorized farmers. They are supplied by
helicopters from the Pathet Lao [ປະເທດລາວ]
in northern Laos, some fifty miles away.

By night the insurgents pour down from the
mountains into sleeping villages. They rouse the villagers, set up
loudspeakers, and at gunpoint, subject the peasants to a long
lecture (in some instances for four hours) on the glories of
Communism and the evils of the government in Bangkok. Then they pass
out application forms for membership in the Communist Party (usually
disguised as "The Farmers Progressive Union"). Immediate converts
are taken to the camp in the jungles for training. Each farmer is
asked, again at gunpoint, to contribute rice. If he doesn’t have the
rice on hand, he is ordered to have it gathered by the next full
moon and told that somebody will be there to collect it."

"Inside the station twenty
young Thai men were being photographed and fingerprinted. "We now
have a local law," the officer in charge explained to me, "that
every man in the village must be photographed and fingerprinted. He
must carry his identification with him at all times. The law allows
us to stop and question all males," he continued. "If we find a
fellow without identification, We arrest him on suspicion that he is
a Communist insurgent.""

"It
must be remembered that the government in Bangkok was in dire
straits at the time. Thailand had accepted a Japanese presence of
sorts, and had actually declared war on the United States. Bangkok
officialdom had little, if any, time to spend dealing with the flow
of North Vietnamese refugees into northeast Thailand. Meanwhile, the
North Vietnamese came across the Mekong River in droves, some forty
thousand of them.

The refugees took up
squatter’s rights on land they carved from the edge of the jungles
between Nakornpanom [นครพนม]
and Na Kae [นาแก]. They set up village life,
with their own police and their own government; they perpetuated the
language and customs of North Viet Nam. A remarkably frugal people,
they deliberately ate less than they should, eschewed entertainment,
and saved their money. They never became Thai citizens.

"All the Vietnamese did, " a Thai official
remarked to me, "was to till their fields and stay home and have
babies. "

The refugees succeeded remarkably at both
enterprises. They now rival the Chinese as businessmen in the
northeast; their population has almost doubled. Shortly after World
War Two the Vietnamese refugees were given a stout leg up when the
International Red Cross flooded them with money, food, and
clothing—while the equally poor Thais continued to live on the edge
of starvation. Politicians from the northeast demanded that Bangkok
clear the refugees from the territory. The matter wound up in the
United Nations and an attempt was made at repatriating the refugees.
The attempt failed because the North Vietnamese feigned ignorance of
their background, To a man, they all swore they had no idea where
they came from in Viet Nam; they insisted further that they did not
wish to be caught in the hostilities between the French and Ho Chi
Minh [1890 - 1969], and later Ho Chi Minh and the Americans.

Like most issues affecting the northeast, the
government in Bangkok simply chose to ignore the matter. Bangkok did
order the refugees to close their schools, disband their police, and
become a part of the Thai nation; but these orders, of course, have
not been obeyed. The schools merely went underground and the young
ones continue to be taught that they are Vietnamese, to speak
Vietnamese and Chinese; the police still come out at night and
protect the Vietnamese villages; and the refugees have made few
steps toward integrating themselves into the Thai way of life. It is
simple to spot their establishments—the Krong Throng Hotel and the
Leng Hong Restaurant in Sakolnakorn [สกลนคร];
the exotic camera shop just across the street from the Civilized
Club in Nakornpanom. One can also easily spot their villages. The
homes are built flat on the ground; the Thais build on stilts. And,
as I have already pointed out, the North Vietnamese eat dogs; the
Thais don’t.

Now, twenty years after they first came to
Thailand, the refugees are deeply rooted in the life of the
northeast. Whereas the original refugees never became Thai citizens,
their children, the so-called "born people, " are Thais. There has
been some intermingling and a good deal of intermarriage between
Thais and Vietnamese. But, the Vietnamese are still fiercely loyal
to Ho Chi Minh."

""The
Communists are only taking advantage of a situation that has existed
for years, " Tuam Na Nakorn [ท้วม
ณ นคร],
the mayor of Nakornpanom [นครพนม],
said to me. "I am fifty-eight years old and have lived this issue
all my life. The government in Bangkok has treated the people of my
area like dirt; how dare they now wonder why the people are not
loyal to Bangkok. Why should they be?

"I can remember the days when every politician who fell out of favor
in Bangkok would be banished up here to be our district officer; we
have the worst schools, the lowest income, and we get the bottom of
the bucket when money for roads is appropriated. " Tuam Na Nakorn
(his name means he is the son of a former governor of the province)
paused while he took a long, deliberate sip of whiskey. "I was once
head of the labor union here. The government abolished that because
we were trying to get better wages and working conditions for the
people. Everything we tried to do to help the people was ruled out
by those bastards in Bangkok.

"Go ahead and write it down," he told me. "I
am one man in the northeast who is neither a Communist nor a puppet
for Bangkok. I am now the head of my town. I know what is going on.
They are spending thousands of bahts building fancy buildings for
Bangkok’s district offices up here; but nothing is being done for
the people. At least a thousand men from my town are now either up
in the mountains with the Communists or working with the Pathet Lao
[ປະເທດລາວ] over across the river."

Then, "boom!" The earth shook and the chairs
on the mayor’s front porch rattled.

"You Americans have accomplished something no
foreigners have been able to accomplish in the history of Thailand,"
the mayor lectured me. "We have always been a free people—that is
what the word ‘Thai’ means; we escaped colonialism; we outwitted the
Japanese. But now America has taken over our country. I am very sad
about it all.""

"Our
commitment to Thailand is total and irrevocable," Ambassador Graham
Martin [1912 - 1990]
said to me.

I paused for a long moment,
partly out of shock, but mainly to offer the ambassador time to
clarify his statement; he resumed the leisurely eating of his lunch.

"Does this mean our men will die, if
necessary, to defend the current government in Bangkok?" I asked.

Martin’s reply was instant and unmistakable:
"Yes." Marshall Wright, first secretary of the American embassy in
Bangkok and my other luncheon companion raised his eyebrows at me,
as if to say, "I told you so."

[...]

According to Graham Martin, these are the
major issues involved in the Southeast Asia struggle:

The rising tide of economic expectation
among the masses.

The absence of serious commitment beyond
the village and/or religious level.

The tyranny and corruption of existing
governments—Saigon, Bangkok, and Vientiane [ວຽງຈັນ] in Laos.

Racial tensions between the Chinese and
other ethnic groups

The sectional gulf—class conflict,
actually—between the peasants and the middle class in the
capital city.

The awesome U.S. military presence in
the area.

the threat of Red China.

[...]

"The American program comes to this, " Martin
said. "We must stop Communist aggression in Southeast Asia; We must
support stable and viable governments; we must meet the needs of the
masses in such areas as politics, health, and economics. That is
what we are here to do; that is what we are going to do. " Then the
ambassador made a blunt point: "We are here to stay. Regardless of
what you liberals say, we ain’t going home! " Graham Martin
is an American servant. He is deeply sorry that the Thais do not
have the right to vote, that they have been under martial law for a
decade, that they cannot gather to discuss politics. It pains him
that the Thai rice farmer gets little benefit from the sale of his
grain on the world market and that the salaries of Thai civil
servants have been fixed as of 1957, despite that nation’s growing
national economy. The American ambassador is truly sorry about all
these things, but his prime concern is not the peoples of Thailand.
Graham Martin deeply believes that Thailand will get a constitution
one day soon. He certainly hopes so. Martin’s concern is with
Thailand as a base for our military operations in Southeast Asia.
The struggle against Communism is the only thing that really
matters.

Casually dressed, in a short-sleeved shirt
and slacks, Martin slouched in his chair as he eased it away from
the luncheon table. Alternately closing and rubbing his eyes, he
diplomatically presented the case for American policy. As Ambassador
Martin spoke he knew full well that one of his top aides had given
me the same argument a few nights before, and in less diplomatic
language.

I had opened the discussion with Martin’s
aide by asking how we could justify our presence in Thailand if we
would not accept a Chinese presence in Cuba. Graham’s aide countered
by saying that American internal political and moral ethics are one
thing, that stopping Communist

aggression is another. Therefore we must
abandon our own principles and do whatever is necessary to stop
Communism.

"You liberals want a democratic world, but
you are not willing to do the kinds of things necessary to achieve
that world," he said to me. "This is a dog-kill-dog world; we must
kill those dogs before they kill us."

When I pressed him for the moral basis of
American foreign policy, his reply was shocking:

"It all boils down to the fact that we are
right and they are wrong. What we want for the world is good, what
the Communists want for the world is bad. We have the right to have
our missiles pointed at Russia because they are the bad guys; they
don’t have the right to have their missiles pointed at us because we
are the good guys. The same goes for China: we have the right to be
in Thailand because we are good; China doesn’t have the right to be
in Cuba because they are bad. We offer the best hope for Southeast
Asia; that is why we are here. That is the way things are and that
is the way things are going to be regardless of what we must do to
make it that way." "Suppose we have to kill Asians to do it?" I
asked. "Then, goddamit," he exploded, "we kill Asians!" Ambassador
Martin, of course, didn’t speak with such bluntness, yet he
passionately defended everything we are doing in both Thailand and
Viet Nam. Then he reminded me once again that our present course is
unalterable, that our commitment is irrevocable. Graham Martin
wishes it all didn’t have to happen, that history had given him a
better diplomatic moment. But he is totally committed to the
theology of Americanism. And once one agrees that America is God,
that Communism is the Devil, then everything else follows—morally
so, at least.

There is art in the manner in which Graham
Martin employs language. He effortlessly constructs paragraphs out
of medium-size words, but he somehow manages to convey major
information without reducing the facts to (precise words. Yet the
listener clearly understands what it is that Martin wishes conveyed.
The future of Viet Nam is a case in point. Graham Martin did not say
this in words, yet he clearly indicated to me that he believes the
Communists will probably control all of Viet Nam within ten years.
There is little doubt in Martin’s mind that Ho Chi Minh would win
any national election during his lifetime. American foreign policy
makers are reconciled to this probability. Yet we seek a political,
rather than a military, solution to the Viet Nam conflict."

"Irwin
Pernick, a New Yorker and a veteran Foreign Service officer, arrived
in Yala [ยะลา]
with his wife and child. Now on loan to the United States
Information Service, Pernick and his wife moved into a Thai house
where Mrs. Pernick spends most of her day protecting their daughter
from mad dogs and deadly snakes. Pernick spends his day traveling,
with Thai allies, into remote villages near the Malay border where
they distribute posters and show films depicting the government in
Bangkok as "the good guys, " the Communists as the "bad guys. "

"This approach simply will not work, " she
said. "The people don’t believe in it. Even the sophisticates in
Bangkok know that their government is not a ‘good guy. ’ "

Then she discussed the growing unrest among
the Chinese, Laotian, and Vietnamese minorities in Thailand.

Again, it was not the newness of the
information, but the fact that the Communists are forging their
movement out of this unrest that caught my attention.

"The Vietnamese in the north are not free to
travel, " she reminded me. "They cannot travel from village to
village without the approval of the district officer assigned from
Bangkok. They cannot have their own schools, nor can they hold
meetings. They are not allowed to work at night. Well, this may stop
Communists from meeting in the open, but it also stops the
Vietnamese Catholics from attending church in the next village on
Sunday, and it stops the Vietnamese fishermen from fishing at night
on the Mekong when the catch is good. There is nothing your
Ambassador Martin can do to turn these peoples toward Bangkok. They
have no alternative but to join us. " As she spoke, I remembered
what Maynard Parker [1940 - 1998] had written: "This repression
[against the Vietnamese] has been confining. It has forced many
neutral non-Communist Vietnamese into the hands of the Communist
cadres, street committees, assassination squads, and agitprop teams.
" Then she spoke of the Laotians, most of whom are deeply Thai. In
essence, here is what she said:

There is no question that thousands of
pro-Peking Lao for Laos have filtered into Thailand since 1960. It
is all but impossible to distinguish a Thai from a Laotian Lao. Had
Thailand been a country where people registered and voted, where
individuals were citizens with established records and identities,
it would then be a simple matter to distinguish a loyal Thai citizen
who happens to be of Laotian extraction from a Lao who has crossed
the Mekong bent upon subversion. But the Thai citizen is a
nonentity, practically ignored by his government. Thus, once he
leaves his small village of, say, twenty or thirty families, there
is no way of knowing just who he is or where his loyalty lies. The
result is that hundreds, and perhaps

thousands, of loyal Lao have been arrested
and heldunder the martial law that prevails, often for long
periods of time, until they can prove their loyalty.

"This is why we have taken to the back
villages, " the Thai Communist remarked to me. "For the first time
in their history, the lowly peasants are being asked to participate
in the coming of a better way of life. Bangkok never did this; they
came into the villages and told the peoples what to do. We go into
the villages and enlist the peoples’ help in doing something for the
people themselves.

"Look, " she said, pointing out toward the
street from the cocktail lounge. "See those poor men driving
put-puts [tiny three-wheeled scooter cars that have replaced
rickshaws in Bangkok]; they don’t own them. They drive day and
night, they rent those things from a middleman, a Chinese. These
drivers go home with a few bahts a day. They must pay half of that
for the put-put. This means the driver is lucky if he makes a dollar
a day. Why shouldn’t the state own those things? Why should people
work to make money for other people? If that man has to rent his
put-put, he should be renting it from the state and the rental money
should be going to provide better schools, roads, and housing for
that man and his family.

"The same applies to the rice farmer, " she
continued. "He farms the rice, sells it to a Chinese middleman who,
in turn, sells it to the government. Why shouldn’t the farmer deal
with his own government? Why the middle- man? If the Chinese want
money, let them go out and work for it like everybody else. "

It was at this point that I raised the
question of anti- Chinese feeling among the Thais.

"I am not a racist, " she replied. "This is a
class, not a racial conflict. The rich Chinese exploit their own
people- This is particularly true in the south. The Chinese peasant

is exploited by the Chinese merchant. The
Chinese don’t discriminate, " she added with a touch of flipness;
"they exploit Thais, Laotians, Malays—as well as Chinese. "

Then she abruptly switched to another
subject. "There is something I had made a point of remembering to
talk to you about, " she said. "You have been asking me about
Rassamee [รัศมี]. What you seem not to have discovered is that the
insurgency movement has an enormous following among Thai women.
Rassamee is the glamour figure in the hills, but there are hundreds
of Thai women who serve as messengers and supply officers for the
insurgency. You should understand this because it is the same thing
that has happened to the Negro woman in America. The Thai male has
been emasculated, doomed to the rice fields. It is the Thai woman
who, as a servant, has seen the better life. She, more than the
radio and the television, has taken the gospel of the good life to
the peasants. This is why there are so many women involved in the
insurgency movement. Thai women are insisting upon a better way of
life. "

What would the Thai Communist do if a
constitution were promulgated, if the people, men and women, were
allowed to elect their officials?

"The constitution will come, " she replied
quickly.

"You Americans will see to that. This is the
only way you can save face. But it will be like the constitution you
are promulgating in Saigon. The elections will be so staggered that
the people will never get a sense of full participation and the
electorate will be rigged so that only the pro-Bangkok people will
have power. In fact, " she continued, "the constitution will create
even more dissidents, possible supporters of the insurgency. Bangkok
simply is not going to allow the masses to participate in free and
open election. We will find fertile ground among those who are not
allowed to vote.""

"I
am not critical of the Thai government when their censorship of the
news is essential to national security. Rather, I speak of the all
too frequent instances when the truth is suppressed not for military
reasons, but because it might prove politically embarrassing to the
government in power. Every dictator has abolished freedom of the
press on the grounds that open inquiry and dialogue would endanger
the republic. The great fear, of course, is that free discussion
might well enlighten the people who, in turn, could bring down the
government for malfeasance.

The best
evidence is provided by Thai newspapers themselves. The two Thai
dailies are rigidly controlled by the government. The two
English-language dailies, both foreign-owned, live in fear of being
closed down should they stray too far from the government line. As a
result, the Thai papers fawn and flourish each day as they give
detailed accounts of the goings, comings, and doings of the royal
family. There are documented instances in which editors were berated
for having failed to carry pictures as well as stories of the
activities of the royal ones. When I was in Thailand, not a single
Thai reporter was covering die insurgency in the northeast and the
south. They sit at their desks and write innocuous little stories
about how good things are under the Thanom regime."

"Liang
Chaiyakarn [เลียง ไชยกาล,
1902 - 1986] is one of Thailand’s best-known politicians. Now a
Bangkok lawyer, he was the beloved member of parliament from the
northeast during the days of representative government in Thailand.
He received me graciously and promised to talk as much as the law
would allow.

Question:
Do you plan to run for office once the constitution is promulgated?

Answer: Yes. I
am very anxious to run. I will stand for my old seat from the
northeast.

Question: When
do you think Thailand will have a constitution?

Answer: There
is no way of knowing. I have friends high in government and they say
we should have a constitution in about a year.

Question: What
do you think about the Communist insurgency in Thailand?

Answer: I
cannot speak of that matter.

Question: Do
you think your government is taking adequate measures to arrest the
insurgency?

Answer: I
cannot speak of that. The law does not allow it.

Question: What
do you think of the American presence in Thailand?

Answer: I
cannot speak of that. The law does not allow it.

Question: What
matters can you address yourself to?

Answer: Other
than to say I hope to run for office, I cannot speak. The law does
not allow it.

Question: Can
you exert any effort toward getting a constitution for Thailand?

Answer: No. I
must be silent and wait. I have friends who are in a position to
work for a constitution. Once it is promulgated, I can announce my
candidacy. Question: Is that all you can do?

Answer: Yes. I
can only sit and wait.

Question: Is
there any more you can say as of now?

Answer: No.
The law does not allow it. But please give my regards to the people
of America. I was there as a guest of President Eisenhower. You have
a wonderful country.

"Yet
another insight into why Thai education fails to inculcate
nationalism can be gained by examining the current behavior of
hundreds of teachers in the remote areas. I spent an evening with a
group of American Peace Corps workers in northeast Thailand. One of
them told of an escalating and disturbing development. He was so
determined that his message be heard, that I found a moving letter
from him waiting for me when I returned to Los Angeles. The Peace
Corps worker wrote, in part:

' When you write about what you saw in
Thailand, I hope you include for ALL [capitals are his] to read
that there are some of us who actually cry when we see what the
United States Military Policy is doing to this country.

Tell them about all the Thai teachers who
leave their schools to become interpreters and clerks at our
military bases at three times their original salaries.

Tell them about the Thai agriculturalists
who desert their experimental stations, who desert their work
with the farmers, to work at our military bases.

Their job is "to make the base beautiful
and pleasant to the eyes. " They now get five times their
original salary.

Tell them about the Thai engineers who
leave their road-, dam-, and bridge-construction jobs to build
runways and supply houses for our military bases. They now earn
seven times their original salaries.

"Honestly
translated, this says that the present king’s brother was found dead
in his bed, a bullet between his eyes; that the good King Bhumipol
was plucked out of school in Switzerland by the military plotters
and set upon the throne to keep the masses in mysticism.

There can be no doubt, however, that the king is
the most beloved man in Thailand. He is adulated for both his
ancestry and his much publicized Buddhist piety. King Bhumipol is a
most likable fellow and his activities make excellent fairyland copy
for Thai newspapers. The king blows a smooth saxophone and the word
is that he actually keeps the ruling military junta from excessive
excesses. But, alas, the king is a nobody when it comes to
influencing government policy."

"The
United States Information Service man was a very quiet and correct
civil servant. Though friendly, he smiled slowly. His conversation
was less brooding and more a matter-of-fact admission of the way
things are.

The USIS, which is
chartered by Congress to disseminate information about the United
States in the remote areas of the world, has been transformed in
Thailand into the propaganda arm of the Thai government. Several
times a month this USIS official and his Thai employees go on field
trips into the back villages. They show films and pass out
literature deliberately designed to give Bangkok the "good guy"
image. The pretense is over. The notion that the purpose of the USIS
is to inform people in Thailand about America is openly scoffed at.
Ambassador Graham Martin [1912 - 1990] has barked the orders and the
entire American Information and AID [Agency for International
Development] program in Thailand is devoted to the propagation of
the current Thai regime.

Thai broadcasting, both radio and television,
has been taken over by American AID and Information officers. Many
hundreds of Americans labor in cramped offices of a downtown Bangkok
building, turning out radio and television programs designed to
transmute the ruling junta into the Trinity of Southeast Asia. The
programs are well done, yet the message is as blatant as any paid
political ad. The Thai listeners and viewers are never told that
this is propaganda, that the program has been written by Americans,
that its basic purpose is to sell Bangkok. Like the word of God,
these broadcasts simply come through the air on the wings of
omnipotence for the people to hear and obey.

"Can you, in good conscience, tell the Thai
villagers that Bangkok is a ‘good guy’?"

"Look," the USIS officer fired back at me, "I
don’t construct the USIS program. The program is laid out in Bangkok
and Washington. I am told to carry it out. If this is what we have
to do to fight Communism, then this is what we have to do. It
doesn’t make sense to spend American taxpayers’ money to tell Thais
about George Washington and the New Deal when Rassamee [รัศมี] and
Yod are running free in the hills. We have to counteract Communist
propaganda. Granted, Bangkok is far from a free democracy, but it is
the only non-Communist crap game in the country."

"And we are rolling craps for airbases," the
pilot interrupted. "Seven come eleven. Daddy needs a new landing
strip."

Shortly before midnight, those of us who had
managed to survive the Elephant ride went into town for a midnight
snack. Nakornpanom [นครพนม] was bulging with
the military. The voices of America—the shouts of poor Southern
whites and Negroes—crackled through the air:

"Now boy, you pedal this three-wheeled
rickshaw fast; you hear?"

"Yaaahooo! I wish I was in Dixie!"

"Did you hear what that peckerwood mother
said? " "Watch out for that Thai whore in the red dress. She is a
mean one. Last week one of our boys told her she wanted too much
money and she whipped out a knife and cut off her own right thumb.
Scared the shit out of everybody. " "Lordy, Lord! When we got about
fifty miles from Hanoi this morning, the SAMA were so thick you
could gather them like eggs. Those Russian missiles sure can fly
high. sure was glad when the captain ordered us to drop our load and
haul ass out of there. "

"You, Lomax? I
heard you debate Malcolm X [1925 - 1965] in Cleveland. You cats sure
told it like it was. "

"Professor J. L. Lomax your daddy? Man that
cat was my school principal. Ain’t this a bitch. We meet in a
Thailand shit house! "

It was as if all mankind was on an eternal
Elephant ride. Good and evil canceled each other out and the line
between sanity and insanity is called "duty. " I went to my hotel in
hope of a long sleep. It was not to be. For early morning was the
time when things went "boom! " When the earth shook and the tables
rattled."

"Three
weeks later Paul Sithi-Amnuai [พอล
สิทธิอำนวย], Vice
President of the Bangkok, Ltd., stunned an audience of American
scholars who specialize in Thailand by delivering a totalitarian
defense of the current Thai government. "True," Sithi-Amnuai replied
in answer to a paper I had read, "I cannot vote in Thailand. But my
government does provide me the right to cash my checks and travel. I
would rather be a nonvoter in prosperous Thailand than a voter who
shares in the poverty of India."

During
a sharp exchange with me, Mr. Sithi-Amnuai said the American public
had no right to know about their government’s quiet arrangements
with Thailand; he even went so far as to say that Americans should
seriously examine that clause in their constitution which gives them
the right to know what their government is doing. The reserved
anthropologists, economists, and political scientists, who just
hours before thought me to be an alarmist, lost their scholarly
composure. They joined me in demanding to know the exact terms of
the American lease on Thai airbases.

"The Thai government," Mr. Sithi-Amnuai
informed us, "is acting out of self-interest. That is the whole of
the matter. If the world political climate changes, then we in
Thailand reserve the right to change our position. As for the
airbases, you Americans are in Thailand at our pleasure. If we say
‘Yankee go home,’ then Yankee, you go home!"

"Against
the day when the great debate over Thailand erupts— and it will—we
must list the hard facts we know to be true:

We know the current Thai government is a tyrannical military
junta.

We know the Thai peoples do not have a constitution; they
cannot vote. They have lived under martial law for more than a
decade.

We know indigenous Communist insurgents are operating in the
northeast and the south under the leadership of Thais trained in
North Viet Nam and China.

We know that Thai intellectual and military strength is
being drained off into counterinsurgency activity.

We know that Secretary of State Dean Rusk [1909 - 1994] and
Thailand’s Foreign Minister, Thanat Khoman [ถนัด คอมันตร์, 1914
- 2016], formulated a 1962 interpretation of the 1954 SEATO
agreement which, at least so the two countries claim, gives them
the right to act bilaterally and to carry out military maneuvers
they feel are needed to stop either indirect or direct Communist
attacks.

We know that the details of this 1962 memorandum are not
spelled out. We know that the legal and moral basis for
America’s use of Thai airfields, as well as for America’s
involvement against the Thai insurgents, is not set forth in the
Rusk-Thanat document.

We know that America is bombing North Viet Nam from Thai
airbases.

We know that some American forces are training Thais for
counterinsurgency and that other Americans are ferrying Thai
troops into the mountainous jungles to flush out the
Communists.*

We know American AID and Information Services officers have
been transmuted into propaganda agents for the Bangkok
government.

We know Americans are committed to die, if necessary, to
defend the Thai government.

Conterinsurgency in Thailand : the impact
of economic, social, and political action programs (a research and
development proposal submitted to the Advanced Research Projects Agency
[ARPA]). -- Pittsburgh : American Institutes for Research [AIR], 1967-12

Zweck:

"devise reliable and valid techniques
for determining the specific effects of counterinsurgency
programs in Thailand;

apply these techniques to ongoing action
programs to generate feedback data useful both in the
formulation of broad programming strategies and in the design of
the specific mechanics of program implementation;

assist the Royal Thai Government in
establishing an indigenous capability for the continuing
application and refinement of these techniques; and

pave the way for the generalization of
the methodology to other programs in other countries."

American Institutes for Research [AIR]:
Counterinsurgency in Thailand : The impact of economic, social, and
political action programs ; (A research and development proposal
submitted to the Advanced Research Projects Agency. -- Pittsburgh, PA :
American Institutes for Research, 1967-12